Santiago, Chile.

This was to be our second visit to Santiago as we had stayed her a couple of nights before heading to Ritoque. The first time we stayed in the Bellavista quarter which is famous for its art and music hang outs. We were told Bellavista was dangerous but we had no problem there and found it a pretty amazing part of the city. The second time we arrived in Santiago we had a cheap but awesome apartment sorted in the Providencia quarter which is mostly residential so pretty quiet in comparison to Bellavista.

Santiago is home to 50% of Chile's population and is accountable for around 70% of the countries economy. This is easy to tell when walking through the crowded and loud streets of the city which lie below the thick, grey smog that lives permanently above Santiago's inhabitants with only the tops of the buildings seeming to break free. The city is also divided in to four quarters (funnily enough); Bellavista, Providencia, Las Condes and Downtown. The Metro is awesome in Santiago and can transport you to all of these areas quickly, safely and more importantly cheaply.

It's easy to forget you're in Chile when you're in Santiago. If you spent the day without talking to anybody and had an ipod plugged in to your ears you would be forgiven for thinking you were in London, Barcelona or any other big city in the world. Westernisation has hit this city hard with bastardised American culture oozing out of every shop front and magazine advertisement. This then leads me on to the food. If you come to Santiago don't expect your taste buds to be tantalised. The mass majority of food is either fast food (american style) or badly done Italian. Bland is the only word to sum these options up. It's not all bad though, if you're up for a bit of exploring and eating off the beaten path you will be rewarded with some typical Chilean dishes which although not extremely exciting are a tasty and welcomed change from the typical lomitos (hots dogs with everything on them, and I mean EVERYTHING).

I might be making it sound like we hated Santiago, which we really didn't. This city may be less exciting than more rural areas of the county but it did have it's bonuses. We spent a few awesome days riding El Colorado and Valle Nevado where we lucked out with fairly good winter conditions. Valle Nevado is definitely the resort of choice with it's weekly lift pass discounts and more expansive area. Another area we highly enjoyed was the Santa Lucia hill, which sat in Downtown Santiago and offered the most amazing views of the city. Santiago is also full of Artisan markets which are fascinating to explore and a great place to pick up a cheap and reasonably unique item. A high light for me during our stay was our visit to bar La Piojera which was infamous in Santiago for its 'terremoto' (earthquake) drink; a pint of cheap white wine topped with pineapple ice-cream and fernet. Although utterly disgusting this bar was full of boozey locals, all consuming terremotos and singing and dancing to a drunken folk band playing in the corner. We had finally found an authentic glimpse in to local Santiago culture and it was all thanks to a disgusting drink that you stirred with a straw.

One whole month passed and it was time for us to leave Santiago and move out of Chile. We had a blast there, spent time with friends and created some awesome memories, most of which were fuelled by pisco. But it was time to move on and to be honest we couldn't bloody wait. Peru was calling and our feet were itching so it was time to hoist on those backpacks and hit the road again only partially lost and a little bit broke.