Suzi 19/10/06

Went to the Concha y Toro vineyard in the Maipo Valley yesterday. Was really interesting and, because the valley is so flat, completely different from the Mosel Valley and Napa Valley. Great views of nothing but vines for 68 hectares, especially stunning with the Andes in the background.

We learnt how to tell high alcohol content from the droplets running down the side of the glass and how to tell that a wine has been aged for more than 12 months - will impress you all no end with our wine tasting skills when we get home! However, have to confess that, new skills aside, loved the wine tasting itself the most. They gave us two full glasses of two different cabernet savignon wines which, at 12.30pm, before lunch, left us feeling pleasantly woozy! We tried Casillero del Diabo (which I drink at home, available in all good Sainsbury´s!) and Don Melchor, their best wine, which retails at at least 60 dollars. I think you can guess this punchline but I have to say I preferred the cheaper stuff, retailing at only 7 dollars a bottle, you know what they say about taking the girl out of Essex! Really nice day out and we even got let in to the staff toilet at the tube station as they didn´t have a public one and the security guard we asked was so thrilled we could speak some Spanish he opened it for us!

Have enjoyed our time in Santiago and a bit of a rest before we head off to Patagonia, with a nice lie-in every morning. Needed it after all the 4.45am starts in Peru! We have visited the Museum of the History of Santiago and the Museum of Pre-Columbian Art. The latter was quite funny as we already knew a little bit about the different indigenous periods because of the museums we visited in Peru and remarked, upon seeing a decapitator statute, "oh that must be Pukara", to the amazement of the fuddy duddy national geographic types standing next to us!!

Also enjoyed a day out climbing the San Christobel and Santa Lucia hills on Monday. We actually only made it three quarters of the way up San Christobel as we´d bought a picnic and were hungry so we gave in to temptation and stopped. Very nice having a picnic with no-one else around and looking down to a great view of Santiago. We did make it to the top of Santa Lucia, which was the first artificial park in Chile, built on top of a rock, but, in comparison, was hugely busy as they were filming the final of the Chilean Celebrity Love Island there. Seems no-where is safe from reality TV these days!

Enjoyed La Paz very much and was really cheap compared to Peru! Did persuade Thorsten to hire a pedalo before we left Copacabana and had great fun bobbing abut on Lake Titicaca. The waves were quite strong so we actually bounced up and left the water a couple of times when pedalling straight in to them, which was quite a fun experience in a pedalo. The markets in La Paz were fantastic and was quite fun being in the highest capital in the world, visiting the highest cathedral in the world, flying from the highest airport in the world etc etc!! Celebrated our last night with a fab Lebanese meal, not very Bolivian I know but super tasty.

Off to browse round the handicraft markets now and fly to Punta Arenas tomorrow. Exactly 4 weeks today that we´re home for good. It is an old cliche but crikey time flies when you are having fun!