Santiago, Steak & Pisco Sours

 Dear all

What a hectic few days we have had. No sooner had we landed then, Chris had us whisked back to his flat to dump our stuff & then onto a very famous Santiago institution Las Vacas Gordas, where Maria Jose hs wife was waiting with Pisco sours at the ready. The restaurant was packed to the gills with locals enjoying a family lunch & we hastily joined in ! Meat was the order of the day (albeit I had chicken!). The wine was fantastic flowed freely! We even had a little demo outside against the visit from Obama (due the following day) which puts our UK tragic violent diatribes to shame.

 We retired back to Chris & MJ's and lets just say that it went on far too long and got far too messy!
The next day was a total write off for the boys, which didn't really matter as Obama was in town and virtually everything was closed down 'for security' ! We did however manage to take two really good walking tours, one of which took us to a bar at the end to sample a terramoto (earthquake) a terrible mix of fortified white wine, pisco sour and a dollop of pineapple icecream on top.  Sounds disgusting, tastes OK, but boy you couldn't drink two!! They sure do pack a punch

We also got to sample 'coffee with legs' a quaint Chilean tradition from the 1960's when the coffee was so bad that they had to get girls in tight short dresses to serve it in the hope men would be enticed to come in. Nowadays the saleman have more shall we say harder sell tactics with some shops having blacked out windows and regular locked doors for more 'happy moments'! I hasten to add we did the former not the latter! Although there are loads of great buildings including the cathedral the highight for me was the Museum of pre-columbian art which had a fabulous collection of pottery and sculpture.









Our few days here were great & Chris & MJ were great hosts even if we did try to give them liver damage! We are now due to head on a tour with Patchamama down to the Chilean lakes whihc should be fun.

Night all