Last Day in Santiago

Last Day in Santiago Thursday, Feb. 1, Santiago, Chile Well, today is my last day here in Santiago. I´ve done most of what I think I would like to do. I didn´t go up on top of the big hill in town for the view, because the days have been cloudy until 2 p.m. and then have been rather hazy. But I did climb to the top of Santa Lucia (smaller hill near my hotel) and saw the view from there. Last night, I stayed in my hotel room and watched movies--BAD movies. The movie channels show only the horrible films that are popular with teenagers except for one channel which specializes in independent films. Unfortunately, all their films were foreign, meaning that I could not understand the spoken language or read the Spanish subtitles. Anyway, it was nice just to relax after all the walking I had done earlier in the day. Today, I walked a lot, too. I started by heading for Providencia. It´s an upper-class neighborhood just east of the center of town. The shops are elegant, and the homes are fancy. But that´s about all there is to see there. It´s a clean, pretty neighborhood, but.... I did see a photography exhibit from one of the Chilean polynesian islands at the tourist office there, however. It was quite interesting. I returned to my hotel area and had lunch at the same place where I ate two days ago. I had planned to eat at a neighboring place, but their menu didn´t sound good today. I had chicken consome, salad plate (tomatoes, beans, broccoli, and another green vegetable I didn´t know but that the owner wanted me to try--it was good), roast pork in gravy with rice, flan, and Sprite. All that cost about $5 including the tip. I went to the bus station to plan my travels out of here. I had planned to go from here to Curico for 1-2 nights and then go from there to Villarica. Unfortunately, there are no buses operated by the two main bus companies between Curico and Villarica. But I decided it would be bad to try to go by night bus all the way to Villarica tomorrow night. First, they are probably already booked up. Second, what would I do all day here tomorrow? And third, I didn´t want to arrive in Villarica (a resort in the Lake District) on Saturday of the first weekend of the Chilean tourist month. February is the MAIN month for traveling by Chileans. So I am worried anyway about heading to the Lake District. To arrive there on a Saturday just doesn´t sound like a good idea. So I bought a ticket to Curico and will decide when I get there what to do. I will check immediately to see if there are bus companies that provide service between there and Villarica and, if so, whether they have tickets for Saturday night. If not, then I will figure out where to go toward the south that I can get to. Complicating all of this is that I also have to keep in mind that I need to be somewhere on Monday or Tuesday that is big enough someone will speak English to help me get an x-ray of my thumb. If it is healed, I am supposed to get the splint and the pins removed. So.... We´ll see what happens about heading southward and I will report it in the blog. Of course, there is also the unaswered question of whether I can get housing once I get to Curico tomorrow. It doesn´t seem to be a big tourist site, so I am hoping there will be a place for me. Again, stay tuned to this blog for the answer. I´m going out wandering tonight since it is my last night here. I have no particular plans for where to go. I just feel the need to see some of the city by night. Of course, I won´t be seeing the NIGHT LIFE. Dinner time isn´t until 10:30 or 11:00, and night life beyond that doesn´t get going until about 1 a.m.!! I´ll be long asleep by either of those two times.