Hello dear friends
On a wonderfully sunny day I am writing you today from a small café in Valpo, have fun reading the last experiences.
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my alarm clock rang today in time for the breakfast from the bed. I took a shower, ate and took the backpack to the ferry to Puerto Madero. After checking in I went through the security check and then on the ferry that would take me to Uruguay. It was about an hour and a half on the rocking boat to Colonia on the Uruguayan coast.
where we boarded a bus and drove over the country for about two hours before arriving at the bus terminal in montevideo. montevideo is the capital of uruguay and from the bus window i would say it is quite nice here, barely any skyscrapers and cozy atmosphere.
The terminal was very cluttered and after a while I managed to change some money and buy a busticket to the airport.
another one-hour bus ride awaited me at the airport a breathtaking sunset. just before midnight my flight started to santiago.
after landing in santiago at about three in the morning, i was looking for a bus into the city, i would find it in front of the door.
After another hour, I reached the hostel where I had rented for the night. completely exhausted, i finally fell into bed after this long day. a few hours later i woke up for breakfast.
delicious, even with some fruit, i wandered off to meet dante, a brazilian from são paulo, who will work with me on the farm in curacavi. He had suggested walking on the Cerro San Cristobal, a hill in the city, from which one has a great view. up we went by train and down the hill and we talked. it will be his first wwoofing farm, he is understandably very curious about what to expect there. Of course, I was also very much looking forward to the farmlife, I've got a bit tired of the city, I think.
Later in the day I met hostel christina again, we had a lot to talk about, she had covered about the same distance as me. after the hike she went to buenos aires to attend a 10-day silent seminar and then to santiago to work here at the hostel. I also went shopping to cook something for today and tomorrow. It was a delicious vegetable curry with nut. The hostel is in desolate season beside. apart from me, maybe 3 or 4 more guests are there, and that with a capacity of over 70 beds. because I had slept so little today, I moved to bed relatively early.
another delicious breakfast awaited me the next morning at the hostel. While I ate, I planned my day with the tips of Camilla, a friend of the nomad festival, who lives here in the city. I then went to the Museo de la memoria y los derechos humanos, which is centrally located in the city and the history of the Pinochet dictatorship worked up. The museum is free to visit, unfortunately it is not allowed to take pictures indoors. unbelievably interesting and horrible what happened here, absolutely comparable to the germany of the early 40s, in terms of human rights violations. only the dictatorship lasted 16 years and there is still no official apology for the perpetrators. there were camps. There were crematoriums. there was torture. there was abduction. just terrible.
an incident particularly impressed me, in one of the prisons people were blindfolded for days to torture them. Only during the visit to the bathroom could they lift the blindfold and see something. for example, the drain lid in the shower and sink, which was decorated with a seahorse. this became a symbol of captives and men and women adorned their handicrafts in prison with this symbol. It can also be seen on the public canal lids around the museum.
Then I hiked to a small bookstore to drink a café and write something. then i would have arranged a date with camilla and hiked to her house, together we found a nice café with bar, where we exchanged stories of the nomad, she managed the festival kitchen, and talked about the musseum. Later at the hostel I found someone via the couchsurfing app who had offered me to sleep on his sofa for that night. The subway then took me to Eduardo, who lives in the 22nd floor of an appartment complex in the city. he is an actor in the theater and we talked a lot about music and my plan for tomorrow, the hike to the cerro manquehue.
After waking up the next morning, I showered and leased my backpack. Eduardo had offered to leave some of my stuff at the porter of the house, so I can come pick it up alone later. That was perfect and I escorted him to a supermarket where I stocked up on food for the hike. then I searched for the right bus, which brought me near the mountain. I got out in a rich area with many villas and walked up the hill until I came to a plateau where the trail started right and there were no other houses.
Here I took a break and later on the steep climb to the summit. a dusty, dry road lay ahead of me, many cacti when i came to the fork of the road that made me decide to run manquehue or manquehuito, i opted for the lower manquehuito because i was already relatively finished.
arrived on the summit, opened me a wide view of the surrounding landscape. Much smog over this capital, which lies in the valley between the mountains. I could just so the cerro san christobal and the city center recognize.
After lying in the sun for about half an hour and taking some photos, I hiked downhill again to the road where, after a few minutes, a driver took me to the bus stop. Then I took the subway to Eduardo's house and packed my backpack. Then it went nimble on to the station pajarito (birds), which is also a major bus station. Here I had an appointment with dante, I was very late, then we sat in the right bus, we missed our station and had to go back from curacavi to canelas de miraflores, where a few minutes later juan collected us. Together we drove to the farm of Karina, where we expected a delicious dinner and comfortable beds.
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that was it first from the south, but you may look forward with eager anticipation on my next post from the farm. it is paradisical ...
love
Pauli
ps: sorry for the turned pictures