Only one day to kill till we get home again. And I booked us my first ever Viator tour into the Andes, a day tour by coach from Santiago. This is a sign I am getting seriously old and prefer a coach tour to driving in my own rental car. The pick-up time was 6:15 AM and we voluntarily gave up a lush Marriott breakfast buffet for a Nescafe coffee on the road and a mint tea we had to fight for. Including us there were 15 people on board, plus the tour guide. This means 2 Europeans (us), 1 American (who did not like to speak to any of us) and 12 South Americans from all sorts of countries. They looked at us as if we were from another planet. Strange people. Our guide Roscio was fun though. She told us about getting mugged in the streets of Santiago twice in her life and her begging them "Please take anything from me, my money, my phone; but not my weed!" I think this deserves an extra mention. She also talked about some very sexual connotation of the name Rodrigo in Spanish... basially she was fun!
The Andes around Santiago are all a bit "brown". I imagined them to be a bit more like the Bavarian Alps; the lake was great though. It is an artificial lake and serves as water reservoir for Santiago. Cool place. And yes, it was a good choice to take an early coach tour, as by the time we left, the area around the lake got packed with day trippers quickly and I would have cursed my lungs out with all those tourists and those "very intersting" roads. And I always thought former East Germany had a pot hole issue. And not to mention one had to drive through a patch flooded by a waterfall.
Part of the trip was also a mini zoo and a "chocolate house", a place that looks like inspired by 'Hänsel und Gretel' selling overpriced chololates and ice-cream to tourists.
And to my very dear and most beloved friend Marc, who kindly called me an idiot for not knowing that Emus in Chile are called Nandus, I'll attach a photo with a special sign for him below. ;-)
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