Getting to Chile

Day 1 – Time Travellers!

It was finally time to leave NZ and fly to a different continent, so after arranging a midday check-out we spent a lazy morning packing and taking a final look at our fantastic view over Queenstown.

We got an airport shuttle to Queenstown airport where we took a two hour flight to Auckland to get our connection to South America.

Once we arrived in Auckland we checked in and had a couple of hours to kill so we grabbed a coffee and ate some of Shell’s now famous pre-prepared filled rolls. 

Passing security we finally managed to get a lonely planet guide for South America, but we had to pay full price for it in a proper book shop.  At 7 in the evening we boarded our flight to Santiago, which was going to be a nice 10 hour flight and we had not been able to blag emergency seats, so this should make for a comfortable few hours!!

On the flight we quickly got settled and were beginning to think we had a spare seat next to us, only to be disappointed when some lady turned up late! We started to watch an in-flight film and then an evening meal was served, which as usual had the cheese of even more cheese option for Shell, she gritted her teeth and went for the cheese option.

I don’t think Shell or I got much sleep on this plane (if any) as we both managed to watch three films and quite a bit of TV and soon we were being served breakfast which actually did not contain any cheese!!

Now this is where the time travel comes in, we left at 7pm but we found ourselves arriving in Chile after a 10 hour flight, 4 ½ hours before we left at 2.30pm the same day!!  We are for once now 4 hours behind you guys in the UK so we will be calling in the morning (our time) so hopefully we will be less inebriated when we speak to you, although I can’t promise that!!

So off the plane we got and it was now time to put some of those Spanish lessons to use.  We found a transfer desk and arranged tickets on a shared bus to take us into town, only to discover that our usual debit card wasn’t working.  A quick panic, emptying my day bag onto the floor (including my undies) to find our US dollar stash and we were then able to pay for the tickets.

The mini-bus journey into Santiago took around ½ hour and luckily we were the first ones to be deposited outside ours (maybe because it was cheap and in the city outskirts!!).  Managing to check in without too much difficulty we were shown to our room and that’s basically what it was a room with a bed in it – no thrills!

After such a long journey and because it was still just late in the afternoon we found something in the bedroom to secure our luggage to in the room and headed out to see what we could find.

As usual our first thought was of a beer to toast being in a new country, also cause for more celebration as we were on a new continent.

Soon we found ourselves sitting outside a bar around the corner from our hostel drink cold local Patagonian beers (Austral). 

We sat there for a few hours just people watching whilst I struggled to get the caps off a number of beer bottles (quite embarrassing when the barmaid can just twist them off without breaking sweat!!).

The very long day was catching up with us and we had to be up early in the morning for another flight so we decided to forego dinner and just go back to the room to crash out and also transfer some money into our emergency account.