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Peevees' Big Adventure - Santiago to Punta Arenas. Patagonia at...


Santiago to Punta Arenas. Patagonia at last!
 
We arrived in Santiago at 4 PM. Lovely day outside. 70 degrees and sunny and the by-now-unfamiliar feeling of being near the sea again. We had 6 or so hours to kill, so we took a cab into town and saw some sites. Pinochet had died the day before and there were protests in the streets that night. Evidently people thought that death was too light a sentence for the atrocities he committed. We later learned that these protests occur every year on Dec 10th. We don't hear rapid Spanish well enough (yet) to be able to tell you exactly why, but it sounded like that date was significant in his rise to power. A year ago, they burned (verb: quebrar) a bus. We watched as 3 armed policemen with clear shields  walked up to a group of 3 protesters and literally lifted one into a prison-car. I thought that was harsh, as the protesters were just carrying a sign. Lisa thought it was probably necessary to set an example and keep things from getting out of hand as they clearly had the night before (more burned vehicles, etc). Hmmm...

Back to the airport for our next leg: Santiago to Puerto Montt, No Punta Arenas, no Puerto Montt, no Punta Arenas. Well, suffice it to say we had lots of discussion about where to go from Santiago once we realized we had blown our connection and could not take the ferry from Puerto Montt to Patagonia. Punta Arenas won by a nose. The flight was economical, but arrived at 3 am. We checked into our hotel at 3:45 as two very tired travelers. We had started this trip from Cuzco on Saturday morning, and it was now Monday morning, nearly 48 hours later. Train, boat, bus, bus, plane, taxi, plane, taxi... bed. Sounds like an old Joni Mitchell song. Phew...

And now that we're here in Punta Arenas, guess what? We're gonna take a PLANE, just so that we can take a BOAT. Back to... Punta Arenas. There's an explanation...

 
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