Hello From Santiago Chile

Well, we made it to Santiago after a grueling 24 hour trip from home to hotel! This is by far the most tiring trip I have been on and it is only the first day... The flight path  took us across the Yucatán peninsula and then the Pacific Ocean, after that we just hugged the coast all the way to Santiago! The plane was awesome, a 767, completely full of mostly tourists like us. Few planes landed in a short time so the airport was also packed with tourists... the customs lines were moving fast so no problem!

We took a taxi from the airport to our hotel, Marriott. Though this is an early check-in, we still got a beautiful room on the 24 floor with amazing views of the surrounding mountains some are still covered with snow even though it is summer down here...

Today was a recovery day so we just went with the flow in terms of activities... in the morning we went to a mall for coffee and in the afternoon we went to old town for dinner. We did get our steps in though not as many I wanted but that is OK .. Patagonia is yet to come and we needed to rest up... what I learned today is that Chilean people like to have a great time when on vacation or even just weekend  so everywhere we went we were surrounded by people...
We had a great seafood dinner, and it was more than enough food for two hungry people...
My desire to eventually live in Spain has been reinforced ... I love Spanish people for their  fun personalities, love for life and laid back pernoaliries .... 

View from our room

Snow covered mountains in a distance 

Old town Santiago full of people enjoying themselves

A music band in a square with a conductor.. the music was great

A nice mix of old and new

Few tall buildings in Santiago with snow capped mountains in a distance

Another hippie band on a street corner 

We had our first seafood dinner, what a treat!!! 

Santiago at sunset: beautiful colors