A nice day to sleep in. Love it when I don’t have to answer to an alarm clock – that’s how spoiled I am!
Middling breakfast, then we headed back down to Plaza Sotomayor to find a good cup of coffee. So weak everywhere, a girl (nor a guy) can’t get a decent buzz. We tried Melbourne cafe, highly rated, but no good. Lance even ordered an espresso after his disappointing Americano, and it gets closer, but also more bitter. I work on the blog and as the sun started baking us, we head out for a walk. Down to the dock where we met Christian yesterday, and a big cruise ship has pulled in and changed the character of the area amazingly. We don’t hang around too long, but I do manage to find a stand pulling hot churros out of the oil (and had to insist on one of those, not anything from the old pile) and enjoy one as we continue walking:
We go along until Lewis finds a trolley stop, and it’s all aboard for a ride going the opposite direction from yesterday. Still a lot of fun. We exit at the terminus, which is one block away from the bus station. Two tickets back to Santiago and on the the airport later, we’re back on the street and headed into the city mercado and upstairs for a little lunch at the spot Christian told us was very good. Well, didn’t order the best thing on the menu, Bets, that’s for sure. I tried the combination plate, which was filled with seafood, but about as bland as you can imagine:
But it didn’t take too long to see what we should have ordered; this bowl decorated with mussel shells around the outside and filled with seafood of all kinds, broth, big piece of bread sticking out, etc. This doesn’t do it justice, but this is the serving for 4 people:
Holy fish oil, Batman! It was amazing in person. We wandered out, bought some bananas for our early morning departure breakfast, then walked languorously through the city, up the steep hillside, back to our hotel for an afternoon rest (after picking up a piece of strawberry cheesecake on the way).
Dinner in the ‘hood at La Concepcion, recommended by our intrepid guide. Headed in a bit earlier than usual because of a 7 am departure in the morning. The view off the back terrace was fantastic:
Not so crazy about the Chilean love of cheese on seafood. Perfectly yummy clams baked with so much cheese on top I couldn’t taste them!
Oh, the travails of international travel, haha.