School's Out

Last week Jeff graduated his 4 weeks of Spanish Interactive. Since he's done with school we have decided to visit more of the surrounding areas by bus. To save money we only go on day trips so we don't have to pay for hostals.

We went to Zapallar (not pictured) Saturday and spent about 5 hours total on a small, shaky bus. The weather wasn't that great so we didn't stay long. We decided to try the beach again but this time go to one closer. So Tuesday we went to Reñaca, which is only a bit further north than Viña del Mar. The city itself was really nice. It seemed very clean and was pricey. We noticed most of the restaurants were more expensive than in Valparaíso and Viña.

We hung out on the beach for a few hours. The waves were huge so they didn't really allow swimming there; though people still did but only in the shallow areas. The water was freezing cold so we only waded. We got super sunburned, especially Jeff who was trying to tan so he didn't put any sunscreen on at all. He definitely learned his lesson! I forgot to put sunscreen on my legs and the back of my legs got really burnt. I also got burnt a little on my back because Jeff didn't put the sunscreen on my back very well and missed quite a few spots. We're both still in a lot of pain.

Yesterday we took a trip to Santiago for the day. We arrived in town around 11:30am. We visited the Museo Nacional de Historie Natural (National Natural History Museum). It was pretty cool! They had a large insect collection with a ton of huge beatles I've never seen at home! There was also a lot of information about the native birds, reptiles, and mammals. Chile has some pretty different looking animals and I hope I'll be able to see some while we're here. They also had a pretty sweet fossil (dinosaur and other types) collection and the entire skeleton of a baleen whale! I was in heaven. There was also a lot of minerals and meteorites which were fun to look at. Overall, we had a lot of fun at the museum (which only costs $1 for the both of us) and learned some new things about the history of Chile's peoples, animals, and geography.
After the museum we were going to go to the Fine Arts museum but got sidetracked at a park that had a castle and some fountains in it. We're still not sure exactly what it is or what it's for but you had to sign your name before you went in. The picture above is of the Castillo, which we didn't actually go in. On the other side of the park/hill there were a bunch of fountains. It looked fancy. I made the pictures small, but you can click on them to see them full size.

We decided to go to the art museum our next trip to Santiago and instead decided to visit the statue of the Virgin Mary. We saw the statue when we went to the party in Santiago with Nacho. You could see it lit up from the apartment. It's on this huge hill called Cerro San Cristobal.
There's also a zoo in the middle part of the hill but Nacho and his friends said not to go because it's depressing. To get to the top you can take an ascensor, which we did. As you can see it's a very long and very steep ride. That line down the middle is the tracks for the ascensor. Once on the top you had a nice view of Santiago. There was also a small church, more Jesus statues, and a small stage. I think they might do service there. I'm listing a bunch of pictures; don't forget you can click on them to enlarge.












Pics of the elevator tracks and the elevators. The ride was so steep and long you couldn't even see the end. I didn't like the ride much. We were so high and it didn't feel like the most stable thing to be traveling in.






A nice view of the city of Santiago














The Mother of Santiago and a candle/thanks/prayer area next to it.