The next day, on the advice of Rodrigo, we headed for Cerro San Cristobal, a huge hill (mountain in Aussie terms) in the middle of Santiago. We headed up, and enjoyed the views from the top.
There was lots to see and do; a zoo, a couple of swimming pools, but most popular was a large statue of the Virgin Mary watching over the city. We spent a couple of hours taking in the scenery, punctuated by a cable car ride overlooking the city.
Our time in Santiago was very short, but even shorter was our time in Lima, Peru. Originally, we were supposed to spend just a couple of hours in Lima airport, but as time passed we received regular updates of changes to our flight time and flight number out of Lima. In the end, we had close to a day in Lima, and decided to make the most of it.
So we headed for Plaza de Armas (apparently most South American cities have one of these). Despite the name, we were surprised to find armoured vehicles and armed guards scattered around the city square, and a large gathering of people.
We thought we were going to see the President, as most of the attention was focused around Lima Palace. But it turned out to be a daily ritual, the changing of the guard.
We had hoped to embrace the native Peruvian cousine, but we failed miserably. The airport information desk had guided us to a popular street near the Plaza, and there was lots of food -big, greasy hamburgers and chickens. Not exactly the cuisine we'd hoped for, and we ended up retreating into a Chinese restaurant for lunch!
We finished our Lima experience with a quick visit to a beautiful Cathedral.
The journey ended there, and the adventure began!
Chris
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