More Santiago
I took another run at Santiago today. Glad I had the time, and glad to move on.
Plaza de Armas
Just about 2 weeks ago I spent time here with friends, focused on the Providencia and Bellavista neighborhoods and San Cristobal Hill. Today I wanted to spend time in the old center of town and government area.
My flight from Puerto Natales arrived in Santiago last night about 6pm, and I strolled across the baggage claim area to the Holiday Inn where I’d booked a night a while back using one of my annual free stays. This was a good move; I did an hour long video call back to Napa, had a great dinner, and caught up on grading.
I took my time this morning with some more school work and push-ups, checked out, left my big backpack with the front desk, and called a Cabify to take me to Plaza de Armas.
View from the hill
From there I found a coffee shop for a café con leche, then wandered up to Santa Lucia Hill to check out the Castillo on top and see the views. The air was hot and the sky smoggy so not much to see.
Fish and seafood market
Next I went to the Mercado Central, a typical combo market with restaurants, dry goods, and wet stuff like fish, seafood, and meat.
Completo
I had some bad-for-me food objectives for the day; first up was a completo. I found a great counter service with swivel chair spot for one and a Coke Zero. It was fine! Julie is holding back some vomit I suspect as she sees the mayo on top of the dog.
Pastel de Choclo
A longer day was planned given the time I had, but I grew bored with the walking around eventually (museums all closed on Monday or I would have gone to the modern art gallery). So a planned early dinner turned into a late lunch and I had a pastel de choclo, different stuff baked into a sweet corn bread cake. My stuff included: chicken, ground beef, black olives (with pits), hard boiled eggs, and onions. Honestly it was pretty awesome. So many rules broken on that lunch.
Santiago is nice but doesn’t have the depth or warmth of most old European cities. As a tourist I think two days is enough. Then get out to the country.
Service in restaurants (and in general with hotel staff and so on) was extremely warm and attentive. Everybody pays with card it seems, and wait staff have learned to ask for a tip to be included when tapping to pay. Good for them!
And if you want to eat healthier than I demonstrated above, the entree salads I ordered everywhere were giant, fresh, and extremely good. Lots of avocado, hearts of palm, fresh green leaf lettuce, and tomatoes. Generally enough to feed two.