Settling into Santiago

After a 10 hour plus flight, we arrived in Santiago about 45 minutes late at 1:00 p.m.  Seeing the Andes as we flew in was awesome, plus it was about 30C when we arrived!   What a change from the -6C we left in Toronto.  We arrived at the apartment at about 2:30 p.m.  The key was waiting at the front desk.  We are staying on the 23rd floor of an apartment located two minutes from the Mercado Central, the largest food market in Santiago.  Our apartment is on the edge of the Bellavista Barrio which we will explore soon.  One crosses a very murky Rio Mapocho to get to Santiago Centro.  The place is clean and has all the cooking utensils we need.  There is no air conditioning, though the nights are pleasant (around 12-15C).

Here are some photos of our Santiago digs.

Living Room

Alano in the bedroom

Kitchen

On the couch-- dressed for the warm weather

We have a great view of the mountains and Santiago Centro from our small living room balcony.

View across park into Santiago Centro from our living room balcony

View of the Andes in other direction from the balcony

After partial unpacking, we headed out to the market.  It turns out there are a number of market buildings on our side of the small river -- one with meats, one with flowers and another largely filled with vegetables.  We had heard a lot about the fish market and finally found it-- however, it closes at 5:00 p.m. and most everyone had packed up.  We will go tomorrow.  We bought chicken and beans for dinner along with our first bottle of Chilean wine, a lovely Cab Sauv.

Beautiful flower market building

Carnivore sign

Gorgeous vats of pickles and onions

More pickles

The polluted murky Rio Mapocho that we will cross many times

After our market visits, we stocked up on basics at a supermercado before heading back to the apartment.  We were both tired after the long flight.  However, one of the best things about our apartment is that it has an outdoor pool, which turned out to be much larger and nicer than anticipated.  I had to go in for a swim.   Luckily the air was still warm, as the water was freezing.  It was a lovely way to unwind.

This gives a sense of the size of the pool on the second story of the building.

Hard to believe we went from -6C to 30C in a day.  After resting up, we had a late dinner.  Tomorrow, we're going to return to the fish market early and then go for a four hour walk with Free Tour Santiago (modelled after many tours we have done in Europe), where one pays the tour guide in tips.  Looking forward to getting a sense of some of the major sites and Santiago's history, which is fascinating.