That night I had made plans to meet Hans who I had met in the queue at J.Cruz to maybe go out to El Huevo, the egg, or possibly even get the bus or train out to party in Viña Del Mar. We had arranged to meet at 23.00 outside the egg, this meant that I had time to shower, do a bit of writing, eat and drink some beers before I had to go out to meet him.
The night turned out to be a complete DISASTER, I got there early, got hassled by some people they call punks, who are just down and outs who try to busk, beg and sell crap to make some money, they tend to loiter around bus terminals and the busier touristy places. So I waited, walked around the building because he gave no specific location to meet. I waited and waited and waited, no sign of him and I really needed the toilet. I went off to find a quiet street in order to relieve myself, found one, decided to go back and have one last look for him, this time it was already 23.30 so he was half and hour late. I cut my losses and went back to the hostel, had a couple more beers, watched TV, brushed my teeth and went to bed. There were two new people in my room, I was no longer by myself. Earlier in the day the hostel manager had told me that 3 people had arrived and that 2 of them would be in my room. He said there was a Dutch Girl, an Australian girl and a Swedish girl, I had no idea who any of them were or which ones would be in my room but when I went in there were 2 of them sitting on the beds chatting. Their names were Harriet from Australia and Astrid from Holland. They both spoke English but were out in Chile on a university exchange programme, so were mostly talking to each other in Spanish. We started chatting about general things then went to sleep.

Not too sure of the exact time, maybe 3.30 in the morning but it sounded like there was somebody in a room above stomping around quite loudly making as much noise as they could. It got progressively louder and the room started to shake, so much so that it could never have been a person doing it, the whole building was shaking now, shaking really hard. None of us had any idea what was going on, then chunks began to fall off the ceiling and cracks appeared in the walls, then the drawers in the room started flying around, Astrid's bed which was next to mine ended up shifting half way into the middle of the room, car alarms started going off, house alarms, dogs were barking, the building was making this really loud booming sound and creaking. It was an Earthquake, I knew Chile was on a fault line but never expected to be there when an earthquake took place, it felt really powerful, I was a little bit scared for my life and in that situation I had no idea what I could do, there was no real cover in my room, I was on the third floor and the building was very old and seemed as though it was quite buckled after the quake. When it stopped we all evacuated the building, for some reason in my half asleep state, I went to the toilet to wee, then went back to my room to put clothes on, I didn't get any of my things though. We all went outside and the hostel manager started saying not to panic or anything and went round checking if everybody was out, most of us were out apart from 2 American girls who were still in bed, there's no way that they could have been sleeping, firstly the first main shock was so huge then all of the little shocks that followed, no way. The lights had all gone out by this point so it was the time when having a camera phone came in very handy, the focusing light used as a bulb for the video made a good rudimentary torch. The hostel manager risked his life to go in and get them to come out, he was in there a while so must have been doing a lot of persuading to get them to finally come out. Once they were out, the smaller shocks continued. I asked the hostel manager if he had any spare blankets to keep us warm as it does get very cold at night, he said he had some on the ground floor. Him and myself went in, as quick as we could to get some blankets for everyone, we found some, went out gave them to people, went back to get some more, gave them out then went in again, we found enough for everyone so stayed back out. They had got chairs and cushions for people to sit on, a sofa and an armchair. It was easy to tell that everybody was in shock, not just us, the rest of the public too. Cars were driving everywhere, some full, some empty, some with all the clothes and things as if those people are fleeing the city. It seemed to have died down now, no shocks for maybe an hour, so I went back into my room to get some things and a torch, I went up and forgot to get my things and just got a torch, I managed to film some of it on my camera though as I was using that for a torch anyway it wasn't any extra hassle just to press record. When I got down I realised I had to go back up to get a jumper and shoes, I went in as quick as I could got my things and went straight back out. The hostel looked awful, a lot of its façade had fallen off, some of it was hanging off and some was just about being held in place by rotten pieces of wood. Earlier in the day I had actually had a chat to the hostel manager about the construction of the building, h said it has a thick wooded from, with wooden slats and then filled in with mud, literally mud, or at least a more modern version of mud bricks. It was very old too of at least a hundred years. It looked really beaten up with bits fallen and hanging off and cracks all over. Inside wasn't too much better, the stairs was all bent and buckled under the strain, it was still strong but a little out of shape, the kitchen had been ripped apart, the bathroom tiles were all over the floor, there was dust and debris everywhere and cabinets all over the floor. When I had got outside I heard the Americans talking to people asking the most stupid of questions, they asked me if there were usually this many cars out after an earthquake, how the fuck was I supposed to know. They also asked if there were any hotels or stronger newer hostels around or open, again, how the fuck was I supposed to know. They were clearly retard who had no idea of what their priorities were, they wanted to go back in to get some sleep, they were adamant on going back to sleep and waking up at 10, precisely 10. the stupid c**ts. They said they knew all the risks and were going to take full responsibility in case anything had gone wrong, they eventually went back in. I tried to get some sleep on the pavement outside the hostel but was too agitated and uncomfortable to do so. When the sun came out, my room mates, there friend Johanna and myself went off to find a hostel higher up the hill, in theory relatively more safe, especially since we had heard warnings or a tsunami. The poor people who run the hostel also live there so now they must have become unemployed and homeless, they are such lovely people and its such a shame this has happened to them. We left the hostel, headed for the hills but along rather than just straight up. As we got closer and closer to the older part of the city, the more built up and touristy part it was clear that the quake done no where near as much damage as it had where the old hostel was. We were walking up a hill and got touted into another hostel, it was safe, they had felt the shock but it hadn't caused any damage, at least it was safe and was much higher up the hill. We all went to sleep and caught up on what we had missed from the night during the quake, just as I had nodded off, we all felt another big after shock, not enough to do anything major but still pretty big.
After I woke, I went to the hostels common room, power had been restored and the news was on, nobody really knew exactly what was going on but it seemed quite serious, roads had been destroyed, bridges collapsed. In a city called Concepcion which was the closet place to the epicenter, whole tower blocks had collapsed, building had fallen down left, right and centre, it was mass destruction, the whole city looked as though it has been destroyed by the quake. After more news flooded in, we found out that Santiago had been hit pretty bad by it too. We all made a decision to get back to Santiago anyway, it was the capital, was the best city set up to cope with things like this so was a much safer option, even more so if there was a tsunami on its way. We went to have a bite to eat as we were all starving, then headed for the bus station to see if we could get tickets to Santiago. We got tickets for 18.45 that evening. Off we went to a presumably safer place. Astrid's flat mate had said I could stay at theirs for the night, plus she had said that there had been no damage to her flat but the edge decoration and a piece of the balcony of the one opposite had fallen off. When we got to Santiago, the damage looked in no way as bad, most of it had been cleared up though so there was no real way of telling the extent of the damage. Some of the buildings had been cordoned off, the main campus of the Catolica University had been too, some of it had fallen off, it was the university that the girls went or were to go to. When we arrived at Astrid's flat, it looked as though nothing had happened, her flat mat has said that it was shaking a lot, by the sounds of it just as much as where we were but all that had happened was some cups and plates had fallen over and smashed. She cooked us a lovely dinner, had some wine and we all talked about most our first experience with an earthquake. Got a good nights sleep but was rudely awakened by a small after shock at about 8.30 in the morning, turned out to be nothing so I went back to sleep. Watching the news and reading some of the news reports, it was actually a huge national disaster, the earthquake at the epicentre was 8.8 on the Richter scale.

Decided to give J.Cruz another try, I was walking past it anyway so it wasn't as if I was going out of my way specifically for it. There was a big queue again, this time I decided to stay, to brave it to see what all the fuss was actually about. The queue look as if it would take about an hour to clear giving the amount of people in front, how busy it was inside, the ordering time, the eating time and paying the bills. Fortunately for me my luck had just changed, a waiter came out asking if there were any groups of four, may not sound like much as I was on my own but they were looking to people to go in a table of four had just been made. As I was on my own I went up followed by the person behind me who was also alone, then a couple behind us, we all went in but had to wait whilst the waiter clarified some things. I was at the front and the waiter said we had to wait a minute, the table for four had already gone, Chilean organisation coming through again maybe. But soon after that a table for two was made, fine for me and the person behind me in the queue as we were both alone. We were escorted to our seats, I had no idea who he was, we had just been put next to each other and were both equally as excited to see what all the fuss about the chorrilliana from J.Cruz is all about. We ordered single ones that they called half's, and some Kunstmann beer. They were taking a long time to come out, seeing all the dishes past by our table was making us both very hungry, they all looked massive, like a whole plate filled with chips, then onions and chunks of meat. When ours finally came out they looked like dwarves in comparison but still huge,it was a half plate but was easily still enough to satisfy any one's hunger. To look at it didn't look to appealing, it was the crap chips that they seem to have everywhere here, onions that could have done with been nicely caramelised and beef that wasn't too bad but I would have liked it a little less cooked, plus the only sauce to have with it was aji, I could have murdered for some ketchup or some mayonnaise. It didn't taste all that great either, it was okay but by no ways special and I cant say that I would recommend it to anyone, it was a good experience but don't know if it was worth it, at least I can say that I have had one now. Also it was quite pricey, the half with a beer came to $5800 pesos, the beer alone was $1000 pesos which was actually really cheap for a kunstmann, but $4800 pesos for the chorrilliana when I saw on the way in a restaurant window a sign for one that costs $6900 but is a large one, has sausage and a variety of meats on it and comes with a pitcher of beer!

Went for another walk around Valparaiso today, walked pretty much all the way from my hostel along Avenue Errasurriz, the main road that runs parallel to the water, until I got to the entrance to the ascensor Artilleria. The lift took me straight up to the naval museum and naval command. The view from this high up and this end of the city was absolutely stunning, you could see the whole city, also the Chilean armada was very close by in the harbour. It isn't as impressive as the photographs I have seen of the US navy in Pearl Harbour, Hawaii or the British navy's fleet in Portsmouth, England, but it was still very good. I walked along the top of the hill for a bit with no idea of where I was actually going I decided to turn back and go down the hill but this time along the steps next to the lift, they didn't run right next to the lift but snaked through the houses and hills. The lift itself was quite fun, but also very scary at the same time, it was a most basic of wooden carriages with several small windows and doors that didn't even look like they were closed. It was pulled up and lowered down the hill by big wheel and steel cable, it goes along rails obviously to keep it going in a relatively straight line. It is counterweighted by the carriage on the opposite side, when one is at the top, the other is at the bottom and vice-versa. It was really noisy, like the screeching of metal against metal and creaking of the wood and occasional pinging of the cable, it was very wobbly and kept on jolting, it felt as though the rope would snap at any moment and the carriage would go hurtling down the hill and smash on the ground like a ton of bricks. This lift was built in in 1983, has a 30° gradient, is 175m long and at the top has a height of 50m above sea level, so not the oldest, longest, steepest or highest but it probably had one of the most spectacular views as it was on the edge overlooking the harbour and faced the rest of the city. It was equally as scary as it was fun but was very enjoyable, the danger aspect of it made it slightly more interesting.
I managed to find the Lord Cochrane museum, it is literally behind the judicial building, the big blue palace on Sotomayor. Unfortunately for me it was closed, like everything I try and do seems to be. For me this didn't matter too much as I had no interest in actually going in it, it was just refreshing to be near to the top of the hill in the shade on this scorching day, I forgot to put my sun tan lotion on again so had to avoid the sun as much as I could. Turned out that it was open, I had just missed the door and hadn't noticed that it was open, I've just been shooed away by a person who works there because he says they are closing. Oh well, I got the ascensor Cordillia down the hill, this one was built in 1886 so was second oldest, has a 70° gradient making it by far the steepest, is only 60m long so is the shortest and is only 30m above sea level so is the lowest one too. To put it into perspective, the oldest is 1883, the longest is 177m, the same one is the highest at 80m above sea level. They are all very old and presumably just as rickety as each other. The Cordillia one looked much older but felt quite a bit more sturdy than the Artilleria one, but didn't exactly feel me with any more or less confidence.
I was going to go to the cemetery and the old jail but I could feel that my arms and legs might have started to burn again so I made the conscious decision to stay out of the sun as much as possible, I stupidly forgot my lotion at the hostel and didn't want to go back so early. I definitely didn't want to get burnt again though, that was horrendously uncomfortable last time.

This annoyance with getting bottles of beer and taking the bottle back to get it cheaper next time is really confusing, you get charged more initially, but sometimes you don't. What is going on? Next time I'll try to remember to take my old bottles but for now I just bought 24 cans of Brahma extra, it was only $5000 pesos for all 24 around £6 or so, good considering its one of the better beers here.

Went for a long walk earlier all the way along Avenue Francia up to the top of the hills and then along Almeria until I went too far and didn't know where to go, further or head back. I made my way down the hills along back streets, stairways and windy old cobbled roads.
The view from the top of the hill was amazing, you get a panoramic view of the whole city below and around and a view of the whole harbour on the cities western edge.
I was told that Valparaiso is famous for street art and its very easy for me to see why. Along my walk it seemed that most of the good graffiti was either in the really dodgy parts of town or the artier parts by the small galleries, boutiques, trendy bars and art schools. The dodgier parts of towm meant that it was difficult to photograph in those areas as there is a much higher risk of being robbed or mugged, I still took some pictures being careful not to draw too much attention to myself, I didn't really have anything of any value on me, just my camera phone.
The higher tiers of Valparaiso seem to have either grandiose estates and massive houses and buildings or huts that wouldn't look out of place in shanty towns or slums. It is also littered with small parks and squares everywhere you look. All I have to say with exceptional views of the rest of the city. I managed to take lots of pictures of the landscape and of the street art, some I have to say to see in real life would blow your mind, some of the murals looks like huge blown up photographs but up closer have either been airbrushed or just done by someone who is extremely skilled with a spray can. The dodgy parts of town weren't actually that bad, people must just over exaggerate it a lot or I went on a lucky day when there wasn't anybody about, I don't know but its better to be safe than sorry. I wanted to go to the Lord Cochrane museum but couldn't find it anywhere, the map I had was shit and I didn't bother asking anyone. After walking all day and not eating since 9.30 I was quite hungry, I went off all excited to go to J.Cruz and get the world famous chorrilliana, when I got there, there was a massive queue outside, I knew where it was because I went out looking for it yesterday so was easy to find again. It is at the end of an alley way covered in all types of graffiti, some good, some not so good but all looking good as a whole, better than bare concrete. The amount of Chileans on non Chileans who have told me to go to this place to check out the chorrillianas is a joke, more than I can count on one hand, plus the numerous reviews I have read about it. When I had a look yesterday I saw that it was small and I probably did go in the late lunch rush but still, the queue looked as if it would take hours to clear so I left and went elsewhere. I will conquer the chorrilliana another day but today I'm done. I don't know exactly what they are or what they look and taste like but basically its meat, meat, meat, chips and egg. I'll have to find out what they are and write about it another time. On my way to J.Cruz along my walk I went past a greasy spoon that had 2 completos plus a drink for only $1100 which is under £1.50, sounded amazing but my eyes were drawn to this thing called a gigantic! It was a churrasco but about twice the size of a normal one, on my plate it was absolutely huge, must have easily been a foot in diameter. Boy oh boy was it a struggle to finish, even with plenty of aji added, I stupidly didn't order a drink so became very thirsty very quickly. At least now I can say I have tried it even though it wasn't actually that great and I probably will never deliberately have one again.

Just found out why there are so many wires going to and from (concrete) telegraph poles in Chile, I overheard a tour guide speaking English to a few Americans. He said that to save money, a lot of Chileans will cut the wires and connect wires to them that go to their houses to have free access to phone calls, internet and cable TV. What a bunch of geniuses, what a way to stick it to the man!

Didn't really get up to much today, went for a walk to the old harbour to check out the market and to see what's actually going on on the waterfront. The whole central part of the harbour is used for some construction and transportation services so you can't see past the dust, lorries, cranes and cargo holds. In the distance at the old harbour you can see some of the Chilean's naval fleet, there are quite a few ships and I think you can get closer but its right the way round the city to the over side of the horseshoe shape. The Valparaiso banking district and stock exchange looks much like London's, just dirtier and the buildings are no where near as tall. I've noticed that Valparaiso has very interesting architecture, from the large grandiose old buildings to the more modern wood and glass clad buildings, to very old falling apart mansions in the middle of streets to the slightly more impressive congress building, like a big square with a hole in the middle. I was taking photos even though I have been told to be very careful in Valparaiso because random muggings are apparently quite common, makes me feel very safe that piece of information. So I took some pictures of random things then I went for a walk to the congress building to take some pictures of that, I walked all the way around it to find the best place to fit it all in, I found a nice spot round the back that was quiet but not too quiet to be risky in any way,i got my shot but decided I wanted picture from the front of the building. I walked around one side of it, through a bustling park but couldn't get a good shot because of trees and being too close to it. As I went round the other side, I ended up outside the bus terminal which happens to be right opposite the congress building. I have been told by some people that I met that the bus terminal in Valparaiso is very dodgy, when I first arrived it seemed fine, but when I went for a walk it was full of beggars, buskers and generally dodgy looking people. I decided not to draw unnecessary attention to myself so I missed the opportunity to get a good shot of the congress building from the front, it had a massive, weird looking sculpture on the front side.
Waking away from there, I think I inadvertently stumbled upon the Valparaiso red light district, it was right next to a market I had just read about before I left the hostel to go for a walk, I hadn't planned to go there but I did. It must have been the red light district, it was so seedy, I mean just behind the fruit and veg stalls were the most unattractive looking women I have seen in my entire life, ugly is a far too nice descriptive to say about them. They made the prostitutes in the Barcelona red light district look like glamour models and if you have ever seen them then you know how ugly these must be. I'm positive they were prostitutes as they were standing in doorways, were all dressed up in denim suits and mini skirts, they looked battered and beaten, had scars and burns on their faces and I think were being watched by men in the distance. They were all saying something to me as I walked past, I just ignored them but I can imagine the translation of what they were saying being, 'wanna have a good time' or something along those lines. I definitely wont be going there in a hurry, during the day was bad enough I can imagine at night it being an awful lot worse.

Had to wake up early-ish in order to get ready, pack and check out of the hostel by 11.30, once that was all sorted I relaxed in the hostel for a bit, waited for the rest of them to get ready and then we all went out to see off Airien at the bus station, she was going onwards to Orsono for a bit, plus we needed to buy our tickets, the others to Santiago and me to Valparaiso. We saw off Airien on the bus, then enquired about tickets, everything had pretty much been sold out to Valparaiso apart from a couple of camas, very expensive sleeping chairs and some semi-camas, less expensive more luxurious than normal chairs, all of which were no cheaper than $24,000 pesos which was a little more than I would have liked to pay. I made a choice to go back to Santiago with the others for $18,000 on clasico, normal recline-able chairs that are still far better than any bus or coach in the UK. Then from there I would have to get a bus to Valparaiso. The bus was booked for 22.00 so we had to leave the hostel by around 21.00 in order to make it in time. I was a little late because I went and had some fish with Sophia and didn't get to the hostel till 21.10 and I needed to get all my stuff together, we left the hostel at about 21.20 and made it to the bus station through the hectic markets near the bridge by about 21.55 so just made it, not rushed but not comfortably. The bus was okay, not too comfy but would easily do, unfortunately the air conditioning was not working so it got rather too hot to handle. I managed to sleep on and off for about 8 or 9 hours so a fairly good nights sleep I suppose. I was quite uncomfortable because earlier on in the day I had a Mongolian hot dog which was a spiced meat in a hot dog roll with chilli sauce, similar to a completelo but with spicy meat, I think it was this that gave me quite a lot of gas and meant that I had trouble getting comfortable.
Arrived in Santiago around 8ish and I needed to go and sort out my gas problem in the loo, the others waited with my stuff then I came out and said my goodbyes to them all, we loosely arranged to meet up at some point when I am in Santiago myself, for me now I had to go off and get my ticket to Valparaiso, I found one for only $3000 which is pretty cheap, its about the distance from London to Brighton but costs the same as a zone 1 and 2 single on the London underground. The bus was quite a bit more comfortable than that we used to get to Santiago so I accidentally slept some more, I couldn't help myself in the comfort of it all. The bus took about 2 hours to get to Valparaiso, when I arrived I had no idea where to stay so had to go to an internet café to look for hostels online, found one that was cheap and not too far from the bus terminal, it is also a stones throw from the beach. My room has a fantastic view, I'm at the top floor of a three story building and am overlooking a main road but to my left I have the stunning hillside city and to the left I have the beach and harbour.

That night we drank in the basement and watched the opening to the Viña del Mar 2010 festival, I had no idea what was going on as the opening act was some respected Chilean comedian and I couldn't understand a thing he was saying apart from a joke about walking in towards a girl wearing skin tight leather trousers, he said that she must have been death...because you could read her lips from here!!! that's about the extent of what I understood. The stand up went on for ages and was quite boring in my opinion, then he finished, rode off on his chopper and then a minute later reappeared on a different chopper. Then he rode off again and appeared on stage but walking as the presenters introduced him to give him some award of some kind. By this point the girls had left to get the bus to Santiago, we said our goodbyes and everybody exchanged emails and facebook and they were gone. It seemed that the time here was coming to an end, all of the original people had left and it was just me and the other newer ones left, and we were all going our own separate ways tomorrow. We all went out, apart from Sophia who went to sleep about midnight, for what was to be our last full night together, as everybody was so tired none of us could be bothered to go to a club so we went to Tratamundo, a bar I went to on my first night, its owned by the people who own the hostel. For staying at the hostel you get a free beer at the bar, I had already used my mine but most of the others still had theirs to use up. We all went down there, took a seat outside, had some beer, unfortunately Diego didn't like any of the beers he had. It soon got a little chilly outside and there was a table free inside so we went in, not much better with the door wide open so we closed it. I was so tired I nearly fell asleep at the table, I decided I was definitely going to have an earlier one than before. When the bar closed we left and went to see the sea lions for one last time, said our goodbyes, and didn't try anything with them and went to the hostel. I stayed in the basement for a bit then called it a night, still had a beer in the fridge but decided I'd have it tomorrow.

After the empañadas we all headed to the fort at the top of the hill, again, we never actually made it into the fort even though most of them wanted to go in, we just loitered in from of it on the cliff edge. After about an hour of not really doing anything, at least anything productive, we moved on to the beach on the other side of the fort. On the way to the beach we passed a fruiteria, green grocers and they were all talking about getting some melons and some wine and chilling out with them on the beach. What the melon and wine thing is was an amazing idea and very simple, you cut the top off the melon, in our case the vendor did it, then you scoop out as much of the seeds as possible, which was very difficult with flimsy disposable plastic spoons. After you have scooped out most of the seeds, you pour in the wine, we had elected to go for the shittest, cheapest there was, a very acidic, flavourless and generally not very nice white wine. Then all you have to do is drink from it and scoop out the juicy flesh with the spoon and eat. It was actually a rather nice accompaniment to to the cool refreshing sea breeze.

Woke up really late today, around 13.30 or so, not too many of us were actually awake yet and the ones that were seemed a little in a daze, everybody was starting to surface considering some most didn't get back to the hostel till 5 or so and some stayed awake in the basement drinking some more. I went to sleep, I knew how tired I was and needed to get some shut eye.
Two of the girls were leaving tonight, Maka and Jo, as they weren't going till tonight it meant they had the whole day to do whatever, they decided to go to Niebla, as I had already been acouple of days ago I said no. Everybody took so long getting ready that by the time I was sorted myself, they hadn't even gotten ready yet, I was easily talked into going. Pretty much everybody from last night went, including Sophia as it was her day off.
The girls had got everyone really excited about this restaurant that sold 12 empañadas, queso, cheese or marisco which is seafood for $2000 pesos, sounded quite good plus they were all freshly made there and then, pastry, filling and all. I asked what went into the marisco empeñadas and it took about 10 minutes to clarify an answer, finally we came to an agreement that it was oysters. Oysters back in England are considered delicacies for the upper and middle classes and no working class would dream of buying them, unless for Valentines as an aphrodisiac. In Chile the empañadas are peasant food, the seafood one being the second cheapest after cheese but tasted rather amazing. When they came out piping hot, they were served with a Chilean salsa which was basically chopped tomatoes, chopped onions, a very small amount of chilli and chopped corriander. When you bit into the corner of the empañada and poured in some of this salsa it gave it more bite and zing and made it a lot more refreshing on a hot sunny day overlooking the beach at Niebla with an ice cold Kunstmann as accompaniment.

Last night was Sophia's night out in a way, she had the day off today so could afford to have a big one and not worry about having to work. Like all the other nights we sat round drinking, for a change we went in the basement and watched some films whilst beer and nuts were being constantly passed around. We were all just drinking to wait whilst Sophia finished her shift and was free to go out. They had already planned to go to a bar called bunker, it was across the bridge but not too far, maybe a five minute walk or so once over the bridge. I couldn't help myself again and had to go and see the sea lions, see what those fat lumps were up to this evening. Was a little bit rushed as the others had gone off to the bar and a couple of us were just watching the sea lions.
The bar was underground, underneath a restaurant, being called the bunker I would at least expect it to be below something plus I had seen the sign on a bus ride to the brewery. Sophia and her friend who also works at the hostel but on the day shift had been bigging up mojitos, I said margheritas the other day but I meant mojitos. When we arrived, the group were sitting in the corner on a tall table and sitting on stools, there clearly wasn't enough space for everybody to sit so we all moved to the other corner with a couple of sofas and some normal chairs, plenty of space there. On the bar menu, they had lots of cocktails, beers and other alcoholic beverages, I noticed something called a pisco Bunker, turns out that a couple of the others had also. The pisco bunker is basically a litre of pisco in a big glass with a small bottle of coke. When it came to my order, they had run out of these big glasses so the waitress said I could have two smaller ones, it seemed like I got a good deal and had more pisco. The glass the others had was like a vase, it was huge, really tall and wide. The glass I had on the other hand was also big but tall and slender like a glass you would normally get a sundae in not half a litre of pisco. Diego, one of the others with the pisco bunker named my glass the 'pussy glass', probably because it was rather feminine, doesn't matter as it had the same thing inside. Everybody then started referring to me as pussy glass, it was quite funny though to here them saying it in a Spanish accent. I must have gotten quite drunk as I didn't remember going to another bar after that one closed, but we did. I saw a photo earlier on and we were in there for a while. I tried a pisco sour and to be honest I didn't think anything of it, really sharp sour lemon juice with sickly sweet sugar and obviously pisco. I just settled with my glass of house red wine. Not too sure what time it was that we left but the night was still young, as it was a Sunday not much was on, most bars had closed early and clubs weren't open. We all went back to the hostel but on the way I had to go and see the big fat lumps of blubber again. I wanted to say goodbye to them as it may be the last time that I see them. I got really close and stroked one and tapped his belly, then it all went a bit wrong, they seemed a little more agitated than before. I wanted to stroke one of the younger girls but the older brother was going mad and roaring and nearly biting me I decided to give up and go back to hostel and see what's going on. Walking through the door I could smell food, the smell made me really hungry, I was already getting a little hungry, this just tipped me over the edge. I had to boil myself some pasta, I was too impatient so I ate it only half cooked with some soy sauce and raw onions, a decision I wish I hadn't made because the girls in my room would not shut up about the onions. Those of us left over, well, still awake ended up playing uno until about 7 in the morning, then we called it a night, had to get some sleep.

I know it might sound quite boring but I've had fun, event though I only seem to write about food, drink and not really doing anything. It has been good so far, some bad times some good times, some great times. Can't wait for what's to come.

Had the most awesome lunch today, one of the other boys at the hostel, Pablo is a chef and cooked us up a feast. The meal consisted of fresh sliced avocados, sliced tomatoes, sliced onion, lettuce, potato salad, and fish called merluza fried and then garnished with fried peanuts, peppers, spring onion and soy sauce. It tasted amazing, Pablo is a very competent cook. We just sat down in the hostel garden and chilled out eating at a leisurely pace, no rush when you have all day to enjoy this feast, there was plenty of food so, seconds and thirds were a definite option. I could just write about this food for ages but I wont, although it was the only thing I have done all day, taking it easy, very easy. I still cannot stop thinking about the Plasser churrasco, it was so good its stuck in my mind and I cant get it out, need something equally good if not better to replace it. For now I'm perfectly happy to have it there. Tonight is going to be a much more restrained night, not a full blown drink up like last night, it is a Sunday and there isn't as much going on here, just a place called the bunker where they serve really good margheritas apparently. Probably going to have a quite drink or few at the hostel before hand but nothing like last night.

Last night I got taught some rude words and phrases by the Chileans in the hostel, the one that stands out is; chupa la que cuelga conchatumare! The literal translation of it is very rude; suck the one that hangs you mother cunt! Don't know if it will ever come in handy but oh well, it was funny when they taught it to me last night.

After the club the ones of us still around were quite hungry so we went out to look for food, Max and myself remembered that during the day we decided that before we left Valdivia we would have to slap/touch the sea lions. The idea of getting food went out the window and all I could think about was touching a sea lion. They were right up on the ramp at this time so it wasn't too hard to get near them. Once right up close and personal with them they begin to look all the more scary, like one false move and it will bite your arm off. We were slowly edging closer, but the closer we got the scarier it got and they were barking and roaring and generally moving around quite a lot. We had time on our side and we were dead set on touching them, it had to be done and what better time and place to do it than here. The big ones in the middle were a little too difficult to touch, but there was a couple on the side but next to a railing. I managed to walk right past the big one on the ramp and was closer than arms reach to it, I moved in for the kill and gave it a big slap on the belly. To my surprise and I suppose disappointment, they weren't as soft as they look. In fact they felt quite hard with rough fur and tough skin. They feel very similar to cows. I didn't think I got a good enough feel so I went in for another, this time I got closer and hit it a little harder, when I say slap its not a very hard slap, more like a little gentle tap. I had succeeded, now it was bed time, or time to drink some more at the hostel.

That night we went to this club, don't have a clue what the name was but there was a big fuss trying to get in, something about it being free, then $2000 then it became $1000. In English terms that's about £1.20 or so for entrance into a nightclub. This was my first club I had been to in Chile so far, it was exactly what I imagined it to be like, scantily clad girls and lecherous old men and naïve young boys. As we were a mixed bunch, boys and girls it was weird and quite creepy to see a lot of the males in the club being perverted towards the girls. It made me feel a bit uncomfortable but then it just got funny and became like a game, alternating dance partners. The club was playing pretty shit music but I didn't exactly have any high expectations for it, it was just what we needed and fun. A few hours later some of the group started to fade away and go back to the hostel to sleep, a few of us stayed out for longer until the club closed, don't know what time but it was quite late.

Me and the Americans parted ways, I went back to the hostel, they went to theirs and we arranged to meet up back at my hostel around 8/9 that night. I was a little hungry so I ate the remainder of my empañadas. I got some more of the escudo beer but that was it, I forgot to think ahead for the rest of the night. The plan so far was to drink, maybe get drunk at the hostel then go to the fireworks at the casino at 10. More people arrived at the hostel, so the plans slowly started to change. The firework idea went out the window as the Americans didn't get to he hostel till about 9.45 which didn't leave enough time for getting drunk. Everybody at the hostel decided to start drinking and drinking and drinking, then head out later on after Sophia finished work at 12. We all decided to go to a club somewhere down the road. I had drawn the short straw to go and get the alcohol as we ran out far too quick. I was starving so I got a completo and a churrasco, both phenomenal I have to say. Many more drinks later and a few group photos down the line it was time to go out, it was now or never so we all headed out.

The Americans decided they were going to go to the forts in Niebla and generally see what's going on there. I joined them in Niebla and went to the forts, nothing that special but there was a cave to climb in, must have been some storage area when the fort was in operation. There was a museum at the fort about the fort and it had all sorts of pictures, models and dummies, I took a couple of photos then a security guard came over and shouted something about not taking pictures and there being signs saying so everywhere. After maybe an hour we had seen all there was to see in the fort, climbed to the top of a lookout hill, took photos of the canons and ruins where there once stood buildings. The interesting thing about the forts was that they went all along the coast and river into Valdivia itself, it must have been an important place in the colonisation of South America.

Went to the restaurant, like I thought it was quite expensive. After eating I decided I was going to go and have a look in the museum of contemporary art, just to see what sort of thing they have here. When I got there it was closed, they close between 14.00 and 16.00 which was a pain because that was the time I got there. I had a walk around the other side of the river in the museum area and randomly bumped into the Americans. They were just looking at the museum of anthropology and were going to go to the mapuche museum next door. When they went in, me and Max tried to tempt some sea lions at the bottom of a dock to do something. I had some empañadas left over from lunch so I threw one at them but I missed and it landed just short. I threw another one and it bounced off one of their bellies and fell into the water. They are the most lazy of creatures, they eat, swim around ever so briefly then sleep, and sleep and awful lot. They roar then go to sleep again, they move then go to sleep again, you throw a stone at them, they get up moan a little and go back to sleep again. I was watching them for so long and noticed another one trying to climb the stairs to join them on the dock. The big male on the dock was not having any of it and shuffled over and let out an almighty roar, the other got scared and jumped straight back in the water.

Don't quite know what to do today, I really fancy some sea food, after all I am in a place famed for its sea food. Might check out a restaurant and see the prices, if they are reasonable then I'll have to eat something. The restaurants are right next to the fish market, across the road.

On the waterfront there was a sheep that looked as though it was ready for some sort of sacrificial execution, you could tell it was scared as it had the most frightful look in its eyes. Poor thing, but it would make a nice feast if it was to be eaten. Its legs were all tied up and it was being guarded. What are these people, savages, sacrificing a sheep for what seems like nothing, maybe its not even for sacrifice and I'm just imagining things but it is quite a romantic notion to think that they are going to have a ritual sacrifice.

Last night I had a nice hot shower, very relaxing after a long day of walking and drinking. I realised that I had almost completely run out of pesos so had to go to find an ATM to withdraw some cash. On the way back to the hostel I had to do a shopping run and bought, 2 bottle of escudo beer, 2 bottles of Capel pisco, 2 bottles of coke and a bag of peanuts. It was to be a night of drinking games and just general drink and chat. When I got back the hostel I was invited into a drinking game already, if you lost or made a mistake you had to take a shot of tequila, sounded like a good plan. There were two girls who were leaving that night so it was a send off for them, they were going back to Valparaiso on a night bus, that happens to be my next port of call from here. From what I've heard I'm quite excited about it. The drinking games continued up until about 11.30 then they girls left to the bus station, said their goodbyes, some went out to a bar, some stayed at the hostel, I stayed and Eva and Max turned up from their hostel to get on the drink here. We drank and drank and drank, didn't go out anywhere to save money and be a bit lazy so just drank and played games all night long till gone 5 in the morning.

From the bus we could see a lot of fuss on the riverside and wanted to go and investigate so go off and went and had a look. The riverside was chocker block with people, there were stalls every step selling complete and utter crap. I noticed submarine along the river, why is there a submarine in a river in Valdivia, for what possible reason is it necessary to have a submarine here? We went and had a look any ways, it was apparently a museum, but still why here in Valdivia is there a submarine. Another thing that is very peculiar about this place is the fact that there are sea lions in the river and on the banks. I can understand that they are here because of the daily fish market but how did they get here in the first place and why? These big fat lumps of blubber with big sharp pointy teeth and loud barks and groans. They are very cute and ugly at the same time, maybe only cute because they are so fat and look a bit like a sweet potato with fins, a tail and teeth. I don't think I'll ever understand what is going on here both with the submarine and the sea lions.

Far too tired to walk back from the brewery so we got the bus, it only cost $400 pesos to take us right to the centre of Valdivia.

The beer took another 20 minutes or so to come out which was a pain because we were all growing very frustrated. Before the beer came out I ordered some slices or bread with raw minced beef on with a side of onions and sauces. Max ordered some quesos empeñadas. Not really sure what each of the dishes were going to be we chose the cheapest ones. The bread with raw meat was quite nice, the meat had the strangest texture, with all the sauce and onions it was amazing, only problem was it was such a small portion that it made ever so slightly hungrier. Whilst we were eating poor Eva was waiting at the bar to be served so we could get our tasters. The bar staff were just as useless as the waitresses, they do everything in their power to ignore you, each of them has their different ways. One man looks just above you like he's looking straight through you, another just stares forward and doesn't glance at his periphery, others just pretend to do something when clearly they are doing nothing at all. Eva finally got hold of someone and they backed up the demon waitresses statement saying they had run out of cups. This was a pain but we just dealt with it and got on with our column of beer. The waiting around made us all increasingly frustrated and it seemed as if we were all going mad, we were moaning and making jokes about the most trivial of things. I noticed that most of the staff if not all of them do everything they can not to work, they loiter in the outside bit, stand around and chat, pretend to serve people when they aren't. Then after a few minutes they leave to the main room where they stand behind the bar or walk around looking as if they are really busy but they are all just lying. Halfway through the beer, I got too hungry that I had to eat some more, I really wanted to try the crudo Kunstmann, it was a big piece of raw minced beef on a bed of sliced gherkin with slices of toast on the side and sauces. The meat to bread ratio was a joke, it was like 80:20 meat:bread. The bread ran out so soon and left about half the meat. Again it had the weirdest texture, with the gherkins chopped up and mixed in with some salt and the sauce, a little bit of aji, Chilean chilli sauce. The experience of the raw meat was one that I wouldn't mind doing again at some point, maybe with a little more seasoning next time.

Once we sat down, a useless waitress attempted to serve us, we asked for some tasters of all their beers which they definitely did do as we had seen loads of people with them on the way to our seats. About 20 minutes later the demon waitress returned, she had the most vacant look on her face as if she had no idea she was actually alive and was just an empty shell running on autopilot really badly, she didn't have good news, she said they had no more little plastic tasting cups left. We couldn't believe this, it was illogical. We were deciding what we wanted and went for a column as they call it here, in France they call them giraffes. A large plastic tube with a tap on it containing 2.5 litres of beer, we went for the Tobayo beer as we had eliminated all the others.

Over the bridge and there was a sign for the Kunstmann brewery, the sign said 1.5km which was a shock as we had been walking for ages and ages. We all had a guess how long it would take to get to the brewery in just under a mile. Max said it would take us about 17 minutes, Eva and myself were not too sure about that but we went along with it. It took 17 minutes to get there exactly, passing an angora farm and some suburban village built around two old storage towers.

After maybe a few minutes or so we left, Eva's brother took his wife back to their hostel, and the rest of us headed for the brewery. The brewery was about 3km form where we were so it was going to take a while to get there. The walk was straight forward, even though we went the wrong way at first, it was good because I was very thirsty and bought a powerade. The walk to the brewery was taking quite a bit longer than expected but it had a stunning vista, each side of the main road to get there had vast expanses of water surrounded by mountains and trees, the water was full of reeds and looked like how I would have pictured the Mississippi river flowing through the countryside. There was a bridge that from a distance looked far to steep and for no known or understandable reason. When we got there it was a very long and steep bridge but didn't seem so when we were on it. On the hills to the left of us were massive houses, one with a riverside hut, speedboat, jet ski and a helicopter, Max wouldn't stop going on about wanting a helicopter if he had the money. On the right was just a little suburban village.

Yesterday I went to the brewery with the Americans, Max and Eva and Eva's brother and sister in law. On the way we sort of made a detour to check out this party in a park thing. The park wasn't really a park, it was more like a show jumping and general horse riding place but had some spare land that they decided to pitch food stalls and games, plus a small fun fair with rides and all. We were all hungry by this point from the long walk to the park from my hostel via their hostel as they checked out and went elsewhere, somewhere more central in town. The food stalls were very confusing, you sat down and were touted by people from each of the stalls talking about their food and everything. We finally sat down at a bench and I accidentally put my hand in bird poo, because there was bird poo on a bench indoors. The food choices were very confusing, everywhere pretty much had the same menu but we had no idea what looked the best or tasted the best. Max and myself decided to go with steak, egg and chips, the rest went for fried fish. When the food finally came out it was a little worse than we all expected but the steak, eggs and chips tasted okay. The fish on the other hand got mixed reviews, although most of them were the same, they all looked different and probably tasted completely different. Eva's sister in law tried to order things but it seemed every time she ordered something they didn't have it. Then she went to another stall and got the fried fish. When hers came out it looked okay but after only a few bites it turned out to be very bad, it tasted off and very overcooked. We'll what did we expect going to a park and eating in some tacky restaurant area with dirt cheap food, around £4 for a large meal. None of us completely finished our food and headed for a patch of sun out in the park to play a bit of hakisack and relax a bit whilst we digest our food.

Going to go and check out the Kunstmann Brewery just outside of Valdivia at some point today with the Americans from last night. I was up for doing a brewery tour but I checked the website but they don't appear to do tours, still going to check out.

No hot water, what a shame. Fortunately I had a shower yesterday morning and don't feel that dirty, just felt like a shower but I don't need it enough to have a cold one.

Last night I chilled out in the hostel common room, the person who works in the hostel went out to get beer and asked if I wanted any, how could I resist, somebody else doing the hard work and getting the beer for me, I paid of course. The beer was okay, its better than cristal, I think it was called escudo. After a while, I was chatting to Or an Israeli staying in my dorm about going out at night, he mentioned going to this bar, this bar also happens to be a place where you get a free beer for staying at the Hostel Aubergue Latino. Whilst waiting to go to the bar we managed to gather some more recruits who were up for a drink or two, a couple of Americans, one from New Hampshire and one from Wisconsin. We went to the bar after Sophia the receptionist of the hostel finished at midnight, the bar was a bit of a disappointment at first. Firstly we couldn't be served because there were no seats, I have never heard of this before, there aren't any seats so you stand obviously, not here. Then when we did eventually get seats, we had to wait for clean glasses to drink the beer out of which was another set back. When I finally got my beer it wasn't that great, it was in the dunkleweiss style, a dark wheat beer. We decided not to have a big night and just got a few more big litres of escudo to drink then called it a night at 3 in the morning.

Valdivia

I can breath a sigh of relief that I'm now in Valdivia, its a city finally, none of this adventure crap, not saying that its bad just that I'm really not into hiking in the countryside or climbing volcanoes. The best thing about it here is that most of the people speak English, if not all of them, which is a relief. Not that I'm not trying to speak Spanish at all, it just makes it easier to converse at the hostel and meet people and do things. I had a burger on the way from the bus station to the hostel, it was the worst burger I have had in Chile so far. It was still a lot better than any McDonald's burger.

Well, my bus is at 19.10 to Valdivia and its still raining and I'm still wet!!!

I met the Helen and Jo again this morning, they checked out today like me but they are going to Santiago where as I'm going to Valdivia. They told me that they went out last night, got really drunk and stumbled in at 7 this morning, I thought I was late back at 5!
We went out to track down the churrasco from the other night, the one from the greasy spoon. On the way Helen had to wrap up her dads belated birthday gift to get it ready for posting back to England. We found the place, its called Plasser, and there signature dish is the churrasco I keep going on about.

Waking up to the sound of pouring rain again, how fun, I might as well still be at home in England. I had to do the embarrassing thing and ask the hostel owner if he could cut open my lock so I could get into my locker and get my stuff out. Now this means I don't have any padlocks and have the inconvenience of having to get some more, not really what I want to do but it has to be done.

We went back to Sam's to get our drink on and get wasted on Piscola's , Pisco the national Chilean drink and cola. We got some logs and newspapers and went down to the waterside and had a bonfire to keep us warm, we just joked, chatted and laughed all night until we got a phone call from Sam's friends staying in Pucon. They said that there was and afters going on, an afters is just a party that happens after people come back from the bars, like a house party. After waiting around for about 30 minutes with nothing really happening, we found out that there wasn't one happening at all, we had just pointlessly driven for ages. We drove back to Villarrica to drop me off at the hostel where the hostels dog was just barking at me for ages as if I was some intruder. I had to sneak in at gone 5 and then get into bed, still with my mistake of locking my keys in the locker playing on my mind.

At Sam's we just watched a bit of TV and generally took it easy as the weather was too shit to do anything outside. I managed to do a bit of writing after I got out of my soaked clothes. I had ice cream with Sam and his cousins which felt a little awkward as it was if I had just turned up uninvited. For most of the afternoon I helped to tend the fire in the house to make sure the house stayed nice and warm, it turns out that Sam is useless at looking after fires, he hasn't got a clue at all. Sam's sister was tending the fire for a bit but then she had more important duties to worry about like looking after her 2 month old baby and Sam's nephew Christian, what a cute little baby he was. There wasn't too much to do as the weather was so bad outside so we just watched a bit of a film then there were too many distractions so we stopped and just chatted, played with Pepe, Sam's grandmas little white poodle. Later on that night I was driven back to Villarrica to book another night in a hostel because I was not welcome to stay at Sam's house, his auntie wouldn't let me sleep there. So I went back to my old hostel Terra Suiza. Stupidly when I got there I accidentally locked my padlock keys in the locker with the padlock on, for some reason all the spare keys were in there to so I had that on my mind when we went out drinking. Sam's friend took us to a café where we had another hamburger, it wasn't as tasty as the others but it was cheap at $1900 pesos for a complete, with cheese, tomato, ham, avocado and sauerkraut, bargain when you think about the size of it.

Yesterday I just got soaked wondering the streets of Pucon trying to contact Sam's friends to meet up for lunch but didn't have any luck, also contacting Sam was a bit of a pain again as I ran out of the old fashioned $100 pesos coins that you need for the public phones. I had to go to a call centre and managed to contact Sam, he persuaded me to spend the day at his place near Villarrica. On the way to the bus station I stopped by a café that I noticed the day before had completos, hot dogs filled with chopped tomato, avocado and topped with mayonnaise, they were only $1000 for a big hot dog, I decided to go for the one called Italiano as it had the most filling. It wasn't amazing but I was really hungry and it filled the spot perfectly. Then I walked to the bus station, soaking wet and got the bus to Sam's.

That night it just poured with rain non stop, it started around 2 and its still raining to this very minute, bloody awful, I come to Chile and get English weather. Pucon is a completely different place when it rains, the beach is empty, the streets are bare and the market stalls don't open, well the ones who aren't afraid to brave the rain do. What can you do when you are trying to save money, have no way of contacting your friends and don't speak the language, I just walked around the whole town, literally the whole town from corner to corner and around and in and out. I decided that I much prefer Villarrica, it has much more of a lived in feel and its clear to see that its not merely built on tourism, its more Chilean than that.

Words cannot describe how utterly disgusting the hostel was, at least I got a good nights sleep, only because I was so tired, it wasn't comfortable in any way. As soon as my head hit the pillow I conked out. For that reason I never went out or managed to do anything last night which in the long run was probably for the best, I slept well and saved some money that I would have spent going out.

Why is it now raining??? Things just seem to be going from bad to worse, I'm now thinking about getting a good nights sleep, maybe. You know what, this is definitely the shittest hostel I have ever stayed in, in my entire life of going to hostels. The beds are also shit, my bed is wobbling so much it might break at any minute. The pillow is very thin and an abnormal shape and size. Oh my! I am not staying here another night that's for sure, if it wasn't so late I would leave right now and go elsewhere. If I wasn't waiting to hear from Sam or his friends I would go straight to sleep, quite literally.
Words cannot describe how utterly disgusting the hostel was, at least I got a good nights sleep, only because I was so tired, it wasn't comfortable in any way. As soon as my head hit the pillow I conked out. For that reason I never went out or managed to do anything last night which in the long run was probably for the best, I slept well and saved some money that I would have spent going out.

How many stray dogs are there in Pucon, a lot more than in Villarrica, most of the dogs seem to be loitering outside the hostel I'm staying in. Things are not looking up at all for the hostel, I really do not want to be here. I went out for a walk to find a public telephone to call Sam from and I got hassled by this dog, it followed all the way down the road and waited next to me whilst I made my phone call, luckily for me it got distracted and wondered off. The call wasn't too informative as it gave me no more indication if anything was going to happen later. I'm now thinking that I should have been less stingy and gone to either the $10,000 or $12,000 pesos hostels, at least they would have given me guaranteed satisfaction.

I just squashed a catapillar with my pen!!!

I´m mow staying in Pucon at the most grimey hostel I have ever been to, everything seems to be a bidge job. One toilet has dirt all over the floor, a cabinet hanging off the wall, a seat that was just big enough for me to fit my bum on and I don´t have the biggest of bums and a dirty concrete shower. Another toilet has a toilet and basin right in front of the door with barely any space to get through to the shower that is in a pit, the walls are rubbishly covered in vinyl and the shower is all peeling off and the floor tiles are all cracked and smashed. What do you expect when you only pay $6000 pesos a night, well maybe quite a bit more than this but that certainly isn´t the case here.
I am not going to mention the name of this place in order to keep its annonymity, lets just say its in Pucon on a road called Palguin. This is actually making me miss the home comforts of Terra Suiza.
Theres a possibility I might be going out later with Sam and his friends, not sure where or when or if we will actually do anything, I am very tired and I remember Sam´s friends saying how tired they were.

I went into Pucon with 2 of Sam´s friends, they really fancied getting a massive burger and I thought why not, I´m a little peckish and might as well have a nice big burger!!!

So I finally met up with Sam, got a bus from Pucon to a place about 10 minutes outside of Villarrica on the route between there and Pucon. Sam came out to greet me off the bus which was nice I thought as we haven´t seen each other for 11 years now.
He walked me down some steep gravelly hill off the main road towards the lake. The house was right on the lake, quite literally the back garden backed onto a jetty on the lake. It wasn´t a massive house but it was cosy, it had a big log fire, wooden panelled walls like everywhere else, plus I got to meet Sam´s grandparents who had heard a lot about me from Sam and spoke very good English and they had this really cute little white poodle that jumped up to say hello to me when i first entered.
I got a chance to meet some of Sam´s friends who spoke a little English from what they had learned at school, they stil spoke more English than I can speak of Spanish.
On a whim, they asked if I had been or fancied going to a place south of here called Valdivia. I decided why not, spend some time with them and pick up some Spanish and they can learn more English.
Unfortunately things didn´t really go as I´d expected because there was no room for me at Sam´s place and they were having a sort of family summer vacation at their lake house down south.
This little setback meant I had to find somewhere completely new to stay in Pucon.

I spent most of the afternoon at the beach in Pucon but because I am still recovering from my burns I passed the time under a parasol and fully clothed with sum cream all over me. I don´t really want to make the burns worse than they already are, its bad enough at the moment.
The beach was quite a noisy place, there are people walking up and down selling all sorts of things. Some of them agua mineral, bebidas, some are selling fresh squeezed fruit juices, some are selling all sorts of snacks from lollipops to these strange tubular things filled with caramel sauce and also sweet pastries. They are all shouting what they are selling. Then you have the boys on the beach walking round asking people if they need parasols and/or sun loungers, so it´s quite a busy place, thats not including the murmour of hundreds of people tightly packed along the beach.
Ooh, I just spotted my first pigeon in Chile, for some reason it isn´t a wood pigeon even though we are surrounded by tress and mountains and are out in a countryside town, and also the pigeons are on the beach taking the place of gulls.

I might be generalising a bit when I say this but from experience and what other have told me, Chileans tend to be quite unreliable people, in particular with their time keeping abilities. This may not be all of them but so far from the ones I have had to deal with I am led to believe that most of them are like this. Making plans and keeping to them is a very stressful past-time.
I have just been informed that it most Chileans, just the odd exception.

Pucon

Contacted Sam, he is arriving in Villarrica at around 2ish. I went to Pucon with the girls yesterday, Marlon left to go to Valdivia this afternoon and the Canadians from the other night went to volcano Linan because it has free entry and is much bigger than volcano Villarrica.
the bus ride from Villarrica to Pucon was pretty fun, it was a minibus that had been completely filled with seat and had an aisle about a foot wide, it was very old and rickety. The best thing about the bus was there was a mechanic on board, doesn´t really fill me with confidence but at least if anything did go wrong then there would be a mechanic on hand to sort it out.

Pucon is very different to Villarrica, it is much flatter even though it is closer to the mountains and volcanoes. It looks far more midwestern than like a town in the Alps, the houses are still wooden cabins and predominantly wood but have a much more midwestern feel to them. It looks like a good setting for a cowboy film. The view from here is far more stunning than that from Villarrica, the volcano is much closer and the mountins to the east of the lake look almost a stones throw away.
The whole town of Pucon looks more traditional with wooden sign posts and full of bug market squares. The people all seem a lot younger here and there are far more bars and restuarants. The town is also full of tour shops to get the tourists to book tours to the volcanoes, the termes, hot springs and bike tours.
The beach in Pucon is can you guess, gritty like all the other beaches around lake Villarrica. In its defense it is a much larger beach, has more kids and younger people mostly sunbathing and participating in water based activities.

Last night ended pretty much similar to the day, me not really doing much. I went to the supermarket and bought myself some of the freshest and most perfectly ripe avocados that I've ever had, I made myself some simple avocado, cheese and tomato sandwiches, I felt like being cheap and lazy. Marlon turned up a bit before I started eating, the girls arrived just as I had finished eating. They spent the day in a nearby town called Lican Ray, in the hills with beautiful beaches, so I have been told. We were all going to go to this cheap bar recommended by the owner of the hostel but a slight change of plan and everybody feeling a little tired and drained we all ended up congregating in the kitchen all night. A couple of Canadians from Quebec were in the kitchen with us and we all just got into conversation, me on my £1 litre, the girls on wine and the Canadians on Piscola (Pisco is the Chilean national drink, its a sort of brandy based spirit, quite nice and sweet not too harsh on the throat and very smooth) which is Pisco with cola as you might have guessed. The beer soon ran out and I moved onto to my bottle of Pisco purchased for the tidy sum of $1500 pesos which is roughly £2 for a 70cl bottle, result. My Pisco was the cheapest I could find but it still tasted good enough, it certainly did the job. I was chatting to the Canadians for most of the night about Canada mainly, a bit about travelling in general and some on other random things. They pretty much persuaded me to check out Quebec, I am very keen on the idea now, there is a big festival starting around the 6th July and it goes on for a week or so. Sounds good, lots of live bands and world music and its cheap, very cheap apparently about $40 Canadian. Don't quite know if I'll actually be able to make it as I am meeting people in the States a bit before and I don't know how long it will take me to get up to Quebec, if I can I'll definitely do it though.

Still no luck in contacting Sam, he sent me a message explaining how he cocked up and sent me his number wrong with a missing digit. He included his proper number and I gave him a few rings this morning, he didn't answer so I was on a downer again, nothing as of yet but now I have his proper number I'll keep trying.
Finally managed to call him, got through, spoke to him and arranged to meet tomorrow morning at around 10ish. After the call I was in a fairly good mood so went shopping bought some more of the £1 a litre of beer and some minced beef, an onion, some cheese, tomato and some bread to make myself some lunch when I got back to the hostel. Yum yum, made a minced beef and onion sandwich with cheese and tomato, wasn't quite as nice as the thing I made last night but it was tasty enough for me. Could only find minced beef in the supermarket today, no chopped beef chunks. Other than that I spent the day indoors or around the hostel as my burns are quite painful, more than I initially expected. I have had a really lazy and sort of a wasteful day but its been okay, I managed to type all of this up, read a little and stayed out of the sun as to not make my burns any worse.

The night before, we went for a walk to find some bars and to check out the concert on the waterfront, like I thought, the band were really crap, the band were this useless pop/rock group with boring tunes and just generally sounded really shit. We shortly left after only being there for a minute or two. Helen wanted to get some cigarettes so she asked a carabineros or police officer for the non Spanish, they told her there were some bars and pointed out directions, we followed to no avail, we didn't come across a single bar so decided to head back and then cut down some side road. We shortly came across a restaurant/bar that sold cigarettes so Helen was sorted, we were quite hungry by this point but all the food looked quite expensive so we left and went elsewhere, a couple more restaurants down and we decided that this one would be it and my God it was. I ordered this sandwich or burger thing, cant remember the exact name but it was amazing. It was so unbelievably good that I would happily say it was the best sandwich or burger I have ever had, it had lettuce, tomatoes, avocados, green beans, cheese and chopped beef, not minced but roughly chopped, in a beautiful thick freshly baked bun. All the freshest of ingredients and seasoned to absolute perfection. I had that and the girls had a big bowl of chips, we all shared a pitcher of Cristal, a Chilean beer. I don't think I'm ever going to forget that burger, even though I can't remember the name but the taste will stay forever.
The night was still young and it was a Saturday night after all so we decided we would check out a bar of some kind we had eaten. We asked the people who owned the restaurant and the female owner came back to us and recommended a bar called magnolia, it was right at the edge of town all the way along the waterside. I thought it looked rather tacky with parasols and benches and paper lanterns in the shape of magnolia flowers, the girls disagreed and thought it looked quite good. Inside was not what I had expected, it was a really swanky cocktail bar with what appeared to be the Villarrica socialites all hanging out in their respective groups and drinking exotic cocktails. Upstairs was apparently karaoke night but when we went up to have a look all that was happening was a dj was playing cheese and there was a projection on a wall, not very exciting really. The process of ordering a drink was very unusual, you went up to a bar man, placed your order, paid then he gave the receipt to the cocktail waiters and they mixed up the drinks there and then. Took quite a while but was fun to watch, it was like a mini production line at an automotive factory. We got our drinks and went to find a seat but there wasn't any free. We stood by the bar for a minute when a short Arabic man strolled in with big glass balls, he had the strangest hair cuts with a random patch full of hair then it was shaved in a pattern around it. Some Arabic music came over the PA and the man started spinning the balls and balancing them on his body and face and around his arms and shoulders and kept this going then put the ball on his chin and began to play with 6 more slightly smaller glass balls, it was quite clear that he fumbled a couple of times but recovered well. It was a good 2 minutes or so of entertainment. The bar was quite boring after a while and ridiculously smoky, we were all tired so we left and went back to the hostel for some shut eye, none of realised but by the time we got back it was gone 3.

Valentines Day

Its now valentines day, Sunday 14th February and I feel so alone without a Valentine to share it with, probably going to join the girls and spend the day with them. A supposedly beautiful beach is the order of the day, a restaurant owner told us of this beach last night. Everybody was feeling more adventurous so we all decided to go for a longish walk maybe 35/45 minutes. A bloke from our room came along to, he's Marlon from Costa Rica. The walk took us right out of town and along the lake to a sort of beach called Playa Blanco or 'white beach' in English, when we actually arrived there the beach was no more than pebbles and grit like that of the lake in Villarrica itself. It must have been classed as a beach by the locals as it had a lifeguard, was called Playa Blanco for a start. There was an middle aged man with some children, possibly his grandchildren with a stand that hired out parasols and sun loungers to the beach goers.
So far I have been the only one to take a dip in the water, mainly because of my desperation to relieve myself and take a wee in the lake, what better place to do so than in the water itself. Also I have noticed that on my leg there is a small patch of sun burn and also on my arms and neck, it must have been from the brief time I was in the sun by the lake yesterday. After stupidly falling asleep in the sun, even though I was partially covered by my towel, not very well I'd like to add. My left arm and hand, my feet ankles down were all sticking out and are now very burnt, also my neck took a bit of a pounding from the sun over the last couple of days so its pretty burnt as well. I awoke very uncomfortably to find that my extremities were burning like that had just been set on fire, not particularly pleasant. My ankles and left arm and hand are really burning now, my neck is a little sore most probably just as burnt, I'm just thinking that in a few days of being careful I'll be very tanned, at least on the patches that are burnt. The beach was okay but I don't think it was worth the trek there and back at all. It was an arduous trek along a main road without any shaded cover from the sun. The beach was similar to that of the waterfront in Villarrica, it was just grit and pebbles, the water was crystal clear and cool but after a while of just floating around on my own got a bit too cold.

Yesterday evening I met two English girls who were also staying in the hostel and ended up being in the same dorm as me. They are two sisters from Bristol, Helen and Jo. One of them speaks very good Spanish and learnt it at university and has been to Santiago before with loads of Spanish friends. The other is similar to me in the fact that she can understand the basics and can talk the bare minimum needed to get by. Helen, the one who speaks Spanish could easily be passed off as being Spanish she speaks it that well. I had an inkling they were English when I walked passed them in the morning whilst they were on the computer, they don't look Spanish, South American or any other country with a foreign tongue, they looked English. My suspicions were confirmed when I was sitting outside on my laptop and they came over and started playing shit head, a very simple card game that never seems to get boring, no matter how often you play it, at that moment they were on 18-13 games playing a best out of 33.

La Terra Suiza, the hostel I'm staying in on the inside is like a chalet and log cabin, everything is wooden panelled, the walls, the ceilings, the floor is wood, there are wooden beams all over the place, wooden furniture, wood definitely springs to mind. There is an old fashioned wood burning stove in the corner, possibly because it can get very cold here in winter and they don't have central heating or radiators like we do in the UK. The roof is very angular like a chalet and the whole outside has wooden cladding. There is even a three sided shed in the back with all the chopped up wood for the stove and bbqs. The hostel is reviewed in lonely planet, hostelworld's website and pretty much all the tourism booklets about accommodation in Villarrica. I read a review and it roughly reads 'a quite place, good value with firm comfortable mattresses'. I'm sorry but I can't agree with that, it is cheap, it is very comfortable but quiet, please. Its the most creaky and noisy place I have ever been, you can here a toilet flush and tap run anywhere in the hostel, the floor is really clean and squeaky with trainers on. The walls seem to move and creak an awful lot with every movement people make. Plus there is nearly a dog barking constantly outside somewhere. You have to understand that when you stay in a mixed dorm in a hostel, you are never really guaranteed a good nights sleep, you always get the odd snorer or noisy sleeper, I am used to this as I always stay in hostels and don't care too much about it even the lights being turned on and off sporadically for most of the night.

One thing I have noticed about Chile and I'm sure most of South America is like this, there are loads of stray dogs around just wondering the streets and occasionally hassling people, cars and shops. I must have seen at least one hundred since my arrival into Santiago and then to Villarrica, I expect to see loads more the more I get around.
From Buenos Aries I will then go around the bay and into Montevideo, Uruguay. Haven't really planned out the next bit, just going to go into Brazil, stay there a bit going to Rio Dejanero and Sao Paolo maybe a few more places and then back across Brazil into La Paz, Bolivia. From there I want to go into Peru and go to the old Inca ruins in Macchu Picchu. I don't really know the exact route I'll take from there but most likely to go around the top of South America through Columbia and Venezuela and then to the Caribbean and into USA, to New Orleans then up the East coast into Canada, then across Canada and into Chicago and then to take in the sights at Yellowstone National park in Wyoming. From there I'm hoping to go back to Vancouver, Canada then down the West coast through Washington State and into California. I must check out Las Vegas when I'm right by it in California, then from Los Angeles get a flight to Hawaii if it isn't too expensive then to New Zealand and Australia. The rest if I still have time and money is not worth mentioning or thinking about as it is so far away, maybe even a year away.
I can see a stage in the distance on the edge of the lake, it sounds like there is loud music coming from it, maybe a sound-check as its not consistent and occasionally stops for a while. I'm off to investigate it any ways, it has taken my attention away from the natural beauty of the lakes and mountains. It was definitely a sound check, I think that I'll just sit here listen for a while and see what is going on. It is a concert that is due to start at 22.00 and is a big Chilean band called Lucybell + support acts. Maybe I will check it out later. I think this must be a town park or something, there are benches and trees all around with a swing and climbing frame to one side and of course this massive stage in the middle for the concert later on. The fences they have used to cordon off the area where you can't go are very different to those they use in England, for a start these are big and white and look very industrial compared to the smallish steel wiry ones in England. They don't all seem to be hooked into one another either, some are just tied up by wire. This is quite a nice site for a concert though, it is literally right on the waterfront, if it were any closer it would actually be on the jetty.
I just remembered that on the way here on the bus, we passed a sort of warehouse/lumber yard and they had a big sign on the road saying telegraph poles for sale, it was in Spanish of course but was very easy to translate. Out in the yard, there were piles and piles of these ready cut, treated and what looked like more or less fully prepared telegraph poles, there must have been hundreds if not thousands. This just came to my attention because as I was looking around I noticed that all of the telegraph poles here in Villarrica are made of concrete, this begs the question as to why are so many trees being felled for wood and made into telegraph poles when they are even being put to use, it just doesn't make any sense!

At the moment I am sitting on the waterfront by lake Villarrica, it has the most breathtakingly beautiful of views. To the north you have vast wooded hills, to the west you have the hilly town of Villarrica, to the south there are more vast wooded hills and to the east you have Pucon. Behind Pucon is volcano Villarrica, it is a tall 2840m high and is snow capped with a small plume of smoke steadily rising from the peak. In winter time this area becomes a very popular ski resort as there are a few big volcanoes and plenty of places for hiking. The houses are all in chalet form and made of wood. It is very hard to differentiate here from for example a village in the Alps, apart from the fact that everything is in Spanish and its absolutely boiling at around 30°C.
I am sitting down writing, drinking my litre bottle of Brahma Extra, which is a darker and stronger version of the Brazilian lager at 5.5% volume, it doesn't taste too bad either but could definitely do with being a lot colder.
I have given up trying to contact Sam, his phone number or at least the number he gave me isn't working at all, its saying that it isn't recognised. If he doesn't respond to my emails I will completely give up and leave to go to Valpraiso, my next port of call after here.
For most of the morning I sat at my laptop at the hostel and searched the web. An amusing thing just happened, some young kid tried to throw a bag over a little stream by the lake and the bag fell in, he said it was okay because the bag only contained a pair of shoes. He is gradually losing his balance and looks as if he is going to fall in any minute, and he's in, only his feet fell in but still the stupid idiot couldn't throw a bag across a metre and a half stream and then lost his balance and fell in.
Whilst I was bored and a little stressed at the hostel this morning I decided to look into possible places to go travelling to. I even managed to compile a list and a rough plan including rough prices of how I was to get to where and when. My next major stop is going to be Valpraiso, hopefully I can get a lift most of the way if not the bus will cost around $2400 pesos which isn't too much, around £30. I plan to stay there at least a few days in order to check out the city and go to a couple of vineyards in the time. The rough route I am planning to take will give me a few days in Valpraiso then onto Santiago and actually stay there for a few nights or so in the city centre a bit, taking in the sights and hopefully checking out the night life. I have been told about a grimey bare that serves a drink called 'Terramoto' which translates to earthquake, sounds good and strong and all I've heard about it is that it gets you very drunk indeed. In Santiago I'm hoping to get in contact with Sam and for him to show me around the city a bit. From Santiago I am planning to go across the Andes by bus into Mendoza, Argentina and check out the Argentinian wine country. I'll stay there a few days then maybe a couple of days in Cordoba and do the same. Then I'm going to get the bus across Argentina to its capital Buenos Aires, I plan to stay there at least a few days maybe more.
I have just spotted some more snow capped volcanoes over to the north of the lake, don't quite know what they are or how I managed to miss them before. They look quite a lot further away than Volcano Villarrica though. I can imagine this place looking very impressive during winter, when it snows and all the volcanoes and hills and forests and houses are completely covered with snow. It would look like a totally different place but equally as impressive as it is now with the sun shining and the lake glistening like thousands of sparkling diamonds.