backpacking – bioarchnomad

Brno – home to skeletons, mummified monks, and the birthplace of genetics

Brno is the second largest city in the Czech Republic and the largest in Moravia. There is evidence of human occupation in the area since the Neolithic, and documented evidence of the city existing since about 1000 CE. Because of its rich history and culture, the city is a must see for anyone visiting the Czech Republic.

We arrived in Brno at around sunset. Walking out of the train station was a very sketchy feeling experience, as it looked like a place one shouldn’t be at dark here in the U.S. We walked toward where we were staying, Hostel Jacob, which was located in the main square near the church. Once we made it there and checked in (I used my Michigan driver’s license and confused the guy at the desk), we found food at this small fast food place that had pizza and kebabs, both of which were wonderful after not eating since breakfast. It was a weekend night, and Brno is a college town, so of course the streets were full of students heading to nightclubs and grabbing food before going out. We were definitely not interested in joining, as cross-country travel does not exactly promote high energy or desire to go clubbing. We crashed at our hostel pretty quickly to get ready for the long day of ossuary and crypt exploring the next day.

After enjoying the free breakfast in the breakfast nook of the hostel (fresh bread and Nutella!), we made our way to the square and entered St. Jacob’s Church, a stunning gothic church right in the center of the main plaza. The outside of the church is white, and the flying buttresses have been mostly obscured from view, making it look less gothic on the outside. The inside, however, is extremely gothic in style. The giant pillars and ornate ceiling gave it an imposing feeling, but the large windows brought in much needed light to contrast the darkness. The most impressive part of the church though, is located below ground.

St Jacobs Church

Inside the Church

The Brno Ossuary is located directly below St. Jacob’s Church, accessible by a small staircase to the right of the church. There’s a small museum at the entrance by the ticket booth which includes examples of skeletal trauma and pathologies, as well as a bit of art. The main ossuary is located behind a large iron door that leads into a dark brick corridor.

Soon after entering, the walls are made entirely of long bones and skulls. Floor to ceiling there are thousands and thousands of human skeletons placed in various piles. The skeletons came from an old ossuary that was rediscovered in 2001 when construction workers were renovating the cobblestones of the main square around the church. It is the second largest ossuary in Europe, only behind the catacombs of Paris. The bones were collected and moved to an area accessible to the public and the museum opened in 2012.

As you walk further into the ossuary, you will find a large stack of skulls, many of which show symptoms of disease like tuberculosis and syphilis. Evidence of disease continues into the main corridor, which houses hundreds of skulls carefully placed in the piles of femora, tibiae, and humeri. It was fascinating to examine the crania and find evidence of diseases, trauma, and genetic traits. Interestingly, many of the skulls in the ossuary had metopic sutures, which normally fuse together in childhood but occasionally stay unfused into adulthood. One of the most interesting crania has obvious signs of trauma that had completely healed, though it left a giant gash in the frontal. Also in the main corridor were old gravestones and coffins that were found in the excavations. The coffins were painted with scenes of the crucifixion, which were remarkably preserved for their age.

$Healed cranial fracture$

Healed cranial fracture

Wall of bones

Stacks of skulls with evidence of disease

According to the time stamps on my photos, we spent almost two hours in the ossuary looking at the remains. Countless tour groups came and went while we were down there (including a middle aged man carrying a balloon). Eventually, though, we had to leave to get lunch and continue exploring the city. We got a suggestion from the hostel and made our way to a well known Czech restaurant a few blocks away, where we had an amazing Czech lunch of food I can’t pronounce.

After lunch, we made our way through the shopping streets along the main corridor, which had seemed so unsettling the night before, but were actually full of high end shops and restaurants. On our walk, we stumbled across the location where Gregor Mendel lectured on his discovery of inheritance in pea plants in 1865. Not far from this location was the next part of our morbid tour of Brno, the Capuchin Crypt.

Brno shopping district

Historical marker about Gregor Mendel

The Capuchin Crypt is a crypt attached to a monastery where the monks are buried. The bodies remain preserved as natural mummies due to the conditions of the crypt. In the museum section of the crypt, there are many examples of coffins from different time periods, as well as the bodies of some nobles from the mid-1700s. One of the noblewomen was actually buried alive, as her body was not placed in the usual burial positions and there were scratch marks inside the coffin. One floor down from these mummies were the mummies of the monks. The bodies lay in various states of decay along the edges of the room, their heads supported by bricks. There is one coffin in the room, located below a cross. The most recent decedent is placed in the coffin, and the remains that were in the coffin are placed on the floor with the rest of the bodies. Since there are so few monks, there is long enough of a time for the bodies to decay and preserve before the coffin is needed again. The entire crypt was fascinating, but had much less to see than the ossuary so we only spent about a half hour exploring.

This woman was buried alive

Inside the crypt

From the crypt, we walked toward the Cathedral of St. Peter and Paul. This church is also in the gothic style (see a trend?) and is located on top of a hill, giving it a prominent position on the skyline. We couldn’t enter the church due to a wedding, but I was able to climb the tower and see the entire city below. Tiffany was all towered out after Prague and stayed on the ground to look around the church. It was interesting to see the divide between the old city and the industrial districts just on the other side of the train station where we came into the city.

Cathedral of St. Peter and Paul

Brno skyline from the tower

From the cathedral, we continued walking around the city, eventually ending up at Špilberk Castle, a 13th century castle turned Hapsburg prison. We didn’t have time to explore much and see the rest of what we wanted to see, so we walked around the publicly accessible grounds and kept walking toward the Gregor Mendel museum nearby.

The Gregor Mendel museum is located right next to the Abbey where he lived and worked. The foundation of the original greenhouse in which he grew his pea plants is uncovered near the entrance of the museum. Even cooler are the pea plants growing next to the foundation which are descendants of the original experiment. The museum exhibits were very well made, explaining the history of Mendel and other scientists in the region before discussing genetics and how Mendel shaped the scientific community. The most fun part was the kids area, which had X and Y foam benches and a game where you put the green/yellow/smooth/wrinkly peas in the correct petri dish.

The foundation where Mendel’s greenhouse stood

Descendants of the original pea plants from the experiment

Sort the different peas in the museum

We left the museum in late afternoon and slowly made our way back to the hostel. At some point we stopped at a small shop to buy a couple of things we needed. Tiffany needed a small bottle of shampoo, and at this shop all the merchandise was behind the counter, so you had to ask for the item to see it. The lady at the store didn’t speak English, and neither of us spoke Czech, so we spent some time pointing and miming and trying to find words in my Central Europe Lonely Planet Phrasebook. Eventually we got what we wanted and went on our way, but it was a very memorable experience. We went back to the kebab place for supper and hung out in the hostel for the rest of the night. That was our last night in the Czech Republic, as the following morning we left for Krakow, Poland.

Kutna Hora – a day in the infamous Sedlec Ossuary

Kutna Hora is a small town located about 70 km outside of Prague. The town itself isn’t especially beautiful or unique, but it does hold one of the most impressive and macabre sites in Europe, Sedlec Ossuary. The ossuary is affiliated with the cemetery of a nearby church and is located in a small gothic style building in the center of the graveyard.

The sidewalk at the entrance to Sedlec Ossuary

Tiffany and I headed from our hostel to the train station in the late morning, still a bit jet lagged and tired from the previous day trekking around the entire city. As we made our way to the train, we stopped in Wenceslas Square for a small breakfast of berries and a cheese sandwich which we carried to the station. After purchasing our tickets, we spent an hour sitting on the floor eating berries and waiting for the noon train.

After an hour ride, we arrived in the rainy town of Kutna Hora and began our quest to find the ossuary. Our first stop in town was the church which owns the ossuary. This imposing structure, built in gothic style, was surprisingly bright and cheerful inside, as it had a soft yellow paint which covered all the walls. The domes of the ceiling had ornate murals and patterns of white trim. However, there were traces of the macabre inside, such as a section of wall carved out and holding four human skulls and some long bones. There was also a section on the second floor that allowed you to see the original stonework of the walls and arches. Overall, it was a beautiful and quaint church that one would never expect to be home to a site as macabre as Sedlec.

Who needs bricks when you can have skulls?

We carried on walking in search of the ossuary, and with the help of the information desk of the church, we got a map and arrived at the entrance shortly after. We came in through the back entrance of the cemetery, so we had to walk through the paths which criss-crossed the yard to find the doors to the ossuary. Walking in was a shock, instantly the infamous chalice of bones and skeleton chandelier were right in front of us. We bought our tickets (and a couple of skull souvenirs) at the small desk at the entrance and proceeded to spend an hour walking through the tiny building.

From the entrance, you descend down a staircase flanked on both sides by the bone chalices, and below a cross of bones. From here you are standing below the chandelier, which is surrounded on two sides by rooms stacked to the ceiling with human remains. Below the chandelier are displays with human skulls covered with wax from the candles lit above them. Each of these is topped with a cherub figure, topping off the creepy/cool factor of the place.

In one of the side rooms hangs a huge coat of arms made of almost every bone of the body cut and broken into place. My favorite part of this is the bird, whose beak is made of a broken humerus, pecking at the orbit of a skull. In between this area and the opposing room is a small shrine where people throw coins and light candles. We spent so much time analyzing the hundreds of skulls in the ossuary, a foreshadowing of what we would be doing a few weeks later in Romania.

When we finished fangirling over the ossuary, we took a bus across town to St. Barbara’s Cathedral, a stunning example of gothic architecture located on the other side of the city. This building has enormous flying buttresses and exquisite stained glass windows depicting various stories from the Bible. The ceiling is adorned with ornate trim and paintings of the coat of arms’ from families in the region. The church was so much more impressive than the first one we visited that day, but unfortunately we had to rush back to the bus less than 15 minutes later in order to catch the bus back to our train to Brno. I’d love to return to visit the town for more time, especially St. Barbara’s, but that day we continued our journey southeast to the city of Brno.

Prague – the beginning of a whirlwind trip through Central Europe

It’s been a while since I’ve posted anything here, so I’ve decided to start chronicling past travels again. So far, I’ve covered my most recent adventures in South America, but those are only a few of the experiences I’ve had abroad in the past few years. This will be the first of many posts about my 7-month study abroad turned Round The World trip that spanned 17 countries on 4 continents.

It all started with Prague.

A little background: Following my return from a field school in Bolivia in the summer of 2013 (which I’m sure I’ll cover eventually), I began searching for field schools in bioarchaeology to attend the next summer. Well, talking with a grad student from UNC introduced me to Archaeotek, which had a bioarchaeology field school and osteology program that was affordable! After applying and getting accepted, as well as my friend Tiffany from uni (who I’m sure will see this, hi!), we began planning a short backpacking trip across Central Europe —because the flight is the most expensive part, you might as well enjoy Europe once you’re there!

Prague was chosen as the entry point into Europe. There was one reason that we chose this city, Sedlec Ossuary, otherwise known as the Bone Church (though the cheap flights didn’t hurt). On Memorial Day, we left Chicago O’Hare on separate flights, mine being on LOT Polish Airlines, and arrived in Prague at roughly the same time the following afternoon. I had the exit row window seat on my flight from Chicago to Warsaw, which was great not only for sleeping, but also listening to Of Monsters and Men while flying over Iceland and Scandinavia and feeling like I was in The Secret Life of Walter Mitty. Anyway, after barely catching my connecting flight to Prague (thanks LOT for the unnecessary delays!), I arrived and met Tiffany at the airport in the early afternoon.

Flying over the motherland and blasting OMAM

Getting to the city from the airport is not an easy task when you don’t speak Czech and haven’t slept well in 24 hours. After questioning all the information agents, we made it to our hostel after taking the bus to the metro — where we couldn’t find the ticket machine — and then wandering around in circles at the entrance to Muztek metro station to figure out with of the roads went the right direction.

Our hostel, Hostel HOMEr, was located in an old Renaissance era building right around the corner from the Old Town Square and Astronomical Clock. I don’t think I could have asked for a better first hostel experience than this; our room was on the top floor of the building and had a small window that overlooked an enclosed courtyard and the wonderful Italian restaurant on the first floor. Once we checked in and dropped off our bags, we began our two days of adventuring in Prague.

Walking into Prague’s Old Town Square for the first time is probably one of the most memorable travel experiences. The light from the late afternoon sun illuminated the old and colorful buildings with a warm yellow light, which really accentuated the beautiful architecture around the plaza. I can’t think of a better place to first step foot in Europe, I don’t think there’s a more beautiful city on the continent.

Once we were finished admiring the square, we started wandering aimlessly through the convoluted streets of the Old City. We walked by marionette shops, old synagogues, and even a creepy Prada ad which had eyes that seemed to follow you wherever you walked. Eventually we stumbled across the Charles Bridge around sunset, on which walked about halfway across before turning around and visiting a nearby church on our way back to the hostel to find food. There were some fire dancers in the square by our hostel, which we watched briefly but were too hungry to stay for long. After a delicious homemade Italian meal at the restaurant under the hostel, we crashed for the night in what was probably one of the best sleeps ever (food coma + jet lag = bliss).

Believing we were sufficiently rested from travel and the previous day’s exploring, we had a semi-late start for our only full day in the city (in hindsight, this was terrible planning on my part — prospective visitors, you need at least 3 days unless you hate yourself and like climbing stairs all day). It was a cloudy and wet day, which seemed to be a theme for the entire week. Our first stop was the Astronomical Clock tower, since it was literally a 2 minute walk from our hostel. The views from the tower are some of the best in Prague. You can see the red roofs of the old city in all directions, as well as the numerous church steeples that are found across the city. The rain caused the roof tiles to look especially red that day, which made the scene that much more impressive.

We headed to Wenceslas Square next, which took about 5 times longer than it should have because I had yet to understand navigating old European cities at that point. We only stayed for a few minutes before leaving to do other things, like the super fun Museum of Torture, which is such a tourist trap but oh so entertaining to visit (who doesn’t like medieval torture instruments?!).

By lunchtime, we made it to the famous Old Jewish Cemetery, which has gravestones stacked on gravestones in all directions in this small patch of land in the center of the Jewish Quarter. The graves were in various states of decay, with green mosses and lichens slowly enveloping the Hebrew etched stones which lay along the ground. This was the first of many Jewish memorials which we visited in Central Europe. We spent a great deal of time here and the accompanying museum admiring the different types of memorials and the sheer number of graves in the small cemetery.

Closely placed gravestones in the Jewish Cemetery

Continuing on the quest of seeing all the major sites of Prague in the least efficient way possible, we visited the Lennon Wall near the Charles Bridge. The wall has been covered with graffiti for decades, most often quotes or images of John Lennon. There were tons of symbols and writings from exchange students, couples, and backpackers who wanted to leave their mark on the ever changing wall (a few months after we left, someone came in and painted the entire thing white as a modern art piece — it didn’t last long like that).

Thanks to Atlas Obscura, I had one last memorial I needed to visit to complete my list of must sees in Prague — the Memorial to the Victims of Communism. This memorial is located in a park not too far from the Lennon Wall, but isn’t often visited by tourists. It is composed of a haunting series of statues that appear to be slowly melting away the further back it goes. The memorial reads “The Memorial to the Victims of Communism is dedicated to all victims, not only those who were jailed or executed but also those whose lives were ruined by totalitarian despotism.”

At this point in the day, about mid-afternoon, we had yet to eat lunch and Tiffany was about to kill me since we hadn’t seen a restaurant that wasn’t really overpriced in quite a while. Personally, I can go an entire day without eating when I’m traveling because I’m so interested in doing stuff I just forget to eat. This is not the case for Tiffany, and I learned this fact that day after receiving death glares for hours. We stopped at the first restaurant we saw across from the park and had three courses, including these wonderful Nutella crepes which we still discuss to this day.

Having settled the hunger issue, we continued onward toward Prague Castle. Along the way, we encountered another tower viewpoint, which I could never resist climbing, much to the dismay of Tiffany. This particular viewpoint had artists’ depictions of Czech horror stories along the rooms going up the tower, which were unfortunately entirely in Czech and therefore completely useless to me. The view from the top, however, made up for the disappointing displays. It gave a spectacular panorama of the city on the side of the river opposite the Old Square, as well as the Charles Bridge.

After descending the tower, we climbed back up the seemingly endless stairs to the top of Prague Castle. We got lost a couple times on the way up and ended up by some embassies and consulates before finding the correct road to the top. Unfortunately, the castle was already closed for visitors by the time we made it to the top, so we wandered the castle grounds and around the nearby St. Vitus cathedral for an hour or so before heading back down to Charles Bridge to walk across the entire bridge to take photos and head back to the Old Town Square. After walking for miles and climbing innumerable towers, we stopped back at the hostel to rest for a bit and ended up passing out until late the following day, when we left Prague for Brno, via Kutna Hora, home of the infamous Sedlec Ossuary.

Buenos Aires – one week in the spectacular Argentine capital

Buenos Aires is an amazing city with a great energy and culture about it. Founded in the early 1500s, the city has a deep Spanish history and long tradition of immigrants from all over Europe, making it the “melting pot” of South America.
I arrived in BA from Ushuaia in the early afternoon on a Friday and spent an entire week in that great city. The districts are so varied and each have their own little culture and style. It’s a very walkable city, though the metro and bus systems are so cheap and easy to navigate it’s hard not to use them! Since I spent a while here I’ll split it into chunks to make it easier to read (and write!).

Buenos Aires has a number of free walking tours that are excellent. I did two with the same company and had a great time on both. The morning tour went through the Recoleta district, while the second focused on the centre and the classic sites.
National Congress Building

The obelisk from near Plaza de Mayo
The Recoleta Cemetery is a large and gorgeous cemetery in the fancy Recoleta district. The mausoleums are all for the rich and famous, including the former president’s wife Eva Peron. This is probably the #1 thing to see in BA. I spent a good amount of time looking at the large graves (and inside the ones that were cracked open!).
Recoleta cemetery

Grave of Eva Peron
Buenos Aires has the largest number of bookstores per capita in the world. It’s easy o spend a day popping into the many used bookstores around the city. My favorite was El Ateno Grand Splendid, which is housed in an old theatre!
El Ateno Grand Splendid
Plaza de Mayo and the nearby area has a lot of the main attractions of the city, such as the Jesuit church and the cathedral. I managed to accidentally attend the beginning of a mass in the church when trying to see the inside (but the Pope used to live here, so that’s cool).
The Pink House

Buenos Aires Cathedral

Jesuit Church in Plaza de Mayo
The La Boca neighborhood is the colorful part of the city always shown in postcards. What they don’t show, however, is how disgustingly touristy the whole area is. I didn’t particularly care for it, but unfortunately the surrounding area is so dangerous it’s not possibly to explore the less traveled parts to get a true feel for the district.
The famous Caminito

Tourist centre of La Boca
If you need to change US Dollars to Pesos, Florida Street is the place to go. Just talk to the least sketchy person yelling “cambio, cambio” and they’ll take you into a little kiosk to change money. At the time of writing the Dolar Blue rate was 15.86 to $1, which is way better than the official 9.33 to $1.
Florida street
The hipster Palermo district is the place to be if you’re looking for good food and bars in Buenos Aires. The old part of the city is really nice with its quirky cafes and cobblestone streets. I spent an afternoon walking around the district and it was a nice way to spend a relaxing day. There are a large series of parks that connect Palermo and Recoleta that are great to wander about for an afternoon. The Japanese Garden is especially nice. There’s also a park with a metal sculpture shaped as a flower which supposedly opens/closes during day/night.
Palermo street art
The National History Museum in San Telmo (in Spanish only) was nice for killing a bit of time in the neighborhood. I went on a Wednesday and it was free, though the 20 peso entry fee isn’t too bad for the days it isn’t.
National History Museum
The San Telmo district, like Palermo, is also really nice to wander around. There are lots of antique shops around, and every Sunday there is a huge weekend market where you can buy anything old and vintage.
Shops in San Telmo

San Telmo Market
For a piece of BA history, spend some time in Cafe Tortoni, the oldest cafe in Buenos Aires. The submarino there was excellent, and they have free wifi! I wouldn’t recommend having lunch there, but it’s great for a hot drink and a dessert.
Cafe Tortoni
If you want a cheap and excellent Argentine steakhouse, you must go to Las Cabras in Palermo. I went twice, first alone and then with friends. The first time I had the “Gran Bife Las Cabras” which was a steak with all sorts of sides like pumpkin, rice, and fries. The second time, I came with a friend I met in Puerto Varas, the German guys I saw everywhere, and an American girl from my hostel. Three of us split the parrillada completo, which had a number of steaks, chicken, sausages, blood sausage, intestines, liver, and a side of fries. While I wasn’t a fan of the innards, the rest was amazing and totally worth ordering.
Gran Bife Las Cabras

Full Parrillada
Burger Joint in Palermo has amazing burgers for a really great price (60 pesos for a burger or 90 for a meal). The goat cheese and arugula burger was amazing, as was the Jamaican.
Burger Joint

I didn’t do anything particularly touristy in Buenos Aires, and visited almost none of the famous museums, buildings, or theatres, but I had an amazing time. I could very easily see myself living in this city at some point. Unfortunately I’m at the end of my trip, so I have to say goodbye and head to my 25th country, Uruguay!

El Calafate and Ushuaia – five days in Argentine Patagonia

El Calafate is a town in Argentina known for one thing – Perito Moreno glacier. This is the world’s only glacier which is not shrinking, but rather at a state of equilibrium. At the far south of the country lies the city of Ushuaia, the southernmost city on earth. In contrast to the rest of Patagonia, Ushuaia was covered in a thick layer of snow and slush. Because of this, during the winter months the town is alive with skiers and snowboarders from around the world.
My first sight in Argentina was the Perito Moreno Glacier. I had to take a tour to the glacier from Puerto Natales, Chile, in order to see it at all, as I had to change my plans due to lack of buses. This involved a 7 AM bus, a very easy border crossing in the middle of nowhere, and a very long and convoluted route to El Calafate before continuing to the glacier.

We got to the glacier at about 3 PM and had two hours to wander around the many boardwalks and viewpoints. Since I brought lunch with me, I went straight for the boardwalks instead of eating in the very overpriced cafeteria attached to the visitor centre, and it was perfect. Just as I made it to the first viewpoint, I heard a large crash and saw a huge chunk of ice calving off the glacier and fall into the lake below. It was impressive, especially since the snow was falling so hard I could barely see the glacier in the first place, but this part was crystal clear. The snow cleared up after about 40 minutes, showing much of the 14 kilometers of ice behind the front cliffs. In warmer and clearer weather, I think that 2 hours would not be enough to enjoy the entire area, but with cold and snow it was plenty.

Perito Moreno glacier once the snow let up

The bus left for El Calafate at about 5, and we made it back a little after 6. I was the only one who was staying in the city, so I got dropped off at the gas station and walked to my hostel. I stayed at America del Sur and it was incredible. They have heated floors. HEATED FLOORS. After freezing in Bolivia and then again in Patagonia, heated flooring was pretty much the greatest thing. The staff was great, breakfast was included, and it was so warm. When I got here, I also ran into my French friend from the previous two towns and the Brazilian guy from my hostel in Puerto Natales.

I spent the last hour of daylight walking around the downtown area of El Calafate. It’s super touristy, but unlike Puerto Natales, it was actually open! There were lots of crazy overpriced tourist shops and restaurants, but the area was nice enough to make up for it. I went back to the hostel after dark and then went to dinner with my Brazilian friend at a nearby restaurant which was recommended by the hostel. I hadn’t eaten in a restaurant in a few weeks so I was ready so spend a bit more than normal. The place we went was the #1 in town and quite upscale, and the food was incredible. I had a huge portion of Patagonian lamb in a calafate sauce (it’s a local berry). By the time it was all said and done I spent 300 pesos ($20 at the blue dollar rate) but it was worth it!

The next afternoon, after dealing with the hassle of cancelled flights and talking with customer service in Spanish, I flew to Ushuaia. The flight was short, though it was almost prolonged due to a snowstorm at the airport when we were about to land. We ended up landing 20 minutes early somehow and I made it to my hostel by 4. I just walked around the centre for a bit and saw the city for the first day, which was quite nice. The “Fin Del Mundo” sign was only 2 blocks from the hostel, so it was very conveniently located for walking about. The park along the waterfront was really nice, though my photos kept getting bombed by ski teams from random countries (especially the Polish team) who were in the city for a competition.

Ticket vendors along the Ushuaia streets

The next day I decided to go winter hiking in Tierra del Fuego National Park. On the way to the bus station, I had my passport stamped with an “End of the World” stamp at the information centre near the port. The bus to the park was an outrageous 300 pesos ($20 at the blue rate) though it was only 15 km. However, the park was worth the cost. When I arrived, it was snowing quite hard but it quickly let up, with only random heavy downbursts of snow throughout the trek. I spent most of the walk with an older Argentine couple who both had studied some English and wanted to practice, so we had an interesting talk in basic English with Spanish to fill in the blanks. The hiking circuit took about 3 hours, at the end of which was an overpriced cafe for the cold and wet hikers who spent the day in the park. I caught the next bus and made it to the hostel by 4, where I spent the rest of the day keeping warm in the lounge area. I also met a group of Filipino travelers at the hostel and spent most of the night hanging out with them.

The following morning, I slept in way longer than anticipated, but when I finally made it to the lobby, my German friends I had run into so many times were checking into the hostel. Since they showed up, we ended up all trying to hike to the Glaciar Martial but had to turn around near the top due to the weather and the sun going down. The walk wasn’t bad though, just a bit slushy in the streets. We made it back by nightfall and I went to bed early, as I had an early flight to Buenos Aires the following morning.

Mountainous landscape surrounding the city

Punta Arenas and Puerto Natales – five days exploring Chilean Patagonia

Punta Arenas is the gateway city to Chilean Patagonia. The city is the southernmost in Chile, and is the capital of the Magellanes district. It has the only airport in the region, making it the first stop for anyone flying into Chilean Patagonia. Puerto Natales is a much smaller town located just north of Punta Arenas, and is the gateway to Torres del Paine National Park and the rest of the trekking opportunities in Chilean Patagonia.

I arrived in Punta Arenas after a three hour flight from Puerto Montt. Getting to my hostel, Hostal 53 Sur, was easy with the cheap transfer bus at the airport. The staff was really friendly and the hostel was wonderfully warm – much unlike the cold and windy weather outside. Since it was late, I cooked dinner and went to bed early, as I planned to see the city the following morning before heading to Puerto Natales.

I was pleasantly surprised by a pancake breakfast in the morning, apparently included in the hostel fee for the night. I also met up with a French girl who was also staying in the hostel and we ended up touring the city together. After we bought our bus tickets to Puerto Natales, we first headed toward the viewpoint of the city. We ended up missing the main viewpoint, but found a different one that was still really nice. From here we walked toward the cemetery, stopping in a cathedral along the way (where we accidentally let some stray dogs inside).

Punta Arenas is known for its interesting cemetery, which has a wide variety of families located inside. Interestingly, the main gate is closed permanently at the request of the woman who financed the cemetery – she wanted to be the last one to enter it when she died, so there is a side entrance now. Since the city was heavily populated with people from all over Europe, the names on the gravestones are extremely varied.

After the cemetery we went toward the seashore to walk along the coastal sidewalk. The wind was really intense there and was almost strong enough to hold you up if you fell into it. We walked along the water toward the city centre, where we went to escape the crazy wind and to see the last part of the city. The centre is a really nice area, with many statues and memorials scattered throughout its many plazas. The centerpiece of the Plaza de Armas is a large statue of Ferdinand Magellan, who the region was named after. I walked back to the hostel from here to make lunch, splitting from my friend who went to buy some food, and ended up finding the actual mirador along the way. The view was really nice as it was aligned with the streets, giving a better view of the buildings and the ocean. In the late afternoon, I caught the bus to Puerto Natales, located 3 hours to the north.

Monument of Magellan in the Plaza de Armas

I made it to Puerto Natales fairly late in the evening and walked to my hostel, The Singing Lamb. The place was pretty empty the entire time I was there, which was kinda weird but the hostel was really nice so it was fine. The next day I set out to explore the town. There really isn’t much to it, other than the main plaza and the seaside walk. Most of the stores and hostels were closed for the off season, making it seem very dead during my entire visit. The waterfront, however, was absolutely stunning and worth spending a day there just to see. The wind was really strong (as in all of Patagonia) so the waves were quite large. The water is overshadowed by large snow-capped mountains and the ever changing sky. I spent hours along the water listening to music and relaxing, at least until I froze from the wind. Later in the afternoon, I managed to run into the German guys who were on my Salar de Uyuni tour in Bolivia a few weeks earlier – they were staying in the same hostel as the French girl from Punta Arenas, which was crazy. I ended up spending the evening having dinner at their hostel and chatting until fairly late.

Ship docked in the waters off Puerto Natales

Early the next morning I took a day tour to Torres del Paine National Park, one of the most famous places in Patagonia. Unfortunately, just before my hostel pickup came, I had a catastrophic incident with my camera which left it unusable (in case you didn’t already know: DSLR + water = bad time for everyone). It wasn’t a very great weather day to visit TdP, so while the tour was incredible and the landscape gorgeous, I was only able to see the famous towers for about 5 minutes of the whole day we were there. The waterfalls and glacial ice were really great though, and the place we stopped to eat lunch had a spectacular view of a lake and the mountains. On the way out of the park we went to Mylodon Cave, which is a giant cave where they found remnants of the Mylodon (a giant sloth like creature that lived in Patagonia until about 10,000 years ago), as well as evidence of prehistoric human occupation in the region. The stop wasn’t too long but it was quite interesting nonetheless. As soon as we arrived back in Puerto Natales, I made supper and then had an intense conversation about archaeology, anthropology, and everything else with a girl from Germany – which is exactly one of the reasons I love traveling so much.

Suspension bridge on the trail to Lago Grey

The following day I had planned on leaving to Argentina, but due to bus scheduling problems (i.e. there are no Sunday buses), I ended up doing nothing but rest and catching up on things like blog posts for the entire day. I had to book a tour to Perito Moreno glacier from Puerto Natales rather than taking the normal bus due to this problem, leaving me with an extra day and nothing to do (especially since literally everything else was closed since it was Sunday). It all worked out though, and the next morning I was on the bus to El Calafate, Argentina!

Puerto Varas and the Lakes District – tranquil German villages and snow capped volcanoes

Puerto Varas is a charming little town on Lake Llanquique in the Lakes Region of Chile. This area is the beginning of Patagonia, and it’s a perfect place to begin a trip through the region.

I arrived in Puerto Varas after an overnight bus from Santiago. The weather was miserable when I arrived, and the walk to the hostel from the bus station was a very wet ordeal – which was made longer by the marathon taking place on the road I needed to use to get to the hostel. I made it eventually, cold and wet, and the Margouya Patagonia hostel was a welcome relief with its warm sitting area and log cabin atmosphere. After warming up a bit and waiting for the rain to subside, I took a walk around the thoroughly drenched town and along the lakeshore. The town was quaint, with a blend of authentic and touristy shops and restaurants. I didn’t get too much of a chance to walk around though as the rain came back with a fierce vengeance after about an hour so I made my way back to the hostel.

The following morning was a completely different story. The sun was shining and the sky was clear and blue. After breakfast I walked toward the bus stop to visit Vincente Rosales Perez National Park in nearby Petrohue. When I got the to bus stop, I ran into two Brazilian guys who were also at my hostel so we all went to the park together. When we arrived after the hour-long bus ride, we grabbed a quick lunch by Lake Todos Los Santos and went to the trail. The first few kilometers of trail was mostly forest walking, but after that it suddenly opened up to stunning views of Osorno Volcano, which is located at the edge of the park. Continuing further up the trail and toward the volcano, there was a magnificent viewpoint of Lake Todos Los Santos and the mountains surrounding it. We headed back down the trail and toward another mirador, with equally impressive views, before taking the trail down a dried alluvial river bed toward the lake. While the views from the first two miradors were impressive, the scene at the lake was outstanding. The blue water was crystal clear and waveless, causing the mountainous landscape surrounding it to reflect off the surface. It was very hard to leave the beauty of that place. However, we were running dangerously close to the time of the last bus back to Puerto Varas, and still had 4 kilometers to get back. We had so little time we had to run most of the final 2 kilometers in order to make it back by the time (we were told) the last bus left. We made it just in time, just to find out the bus didn’t arrive for another half an hour. It was nice to have time to crash after the run through the sandy trails, but it would’ve been nicer to avoid the entire run altogether. In any case, we got on the bus and made it back to Puerto Varas for a stunning sunset from the lakeshore.

Volcan Osorno from Vincente Perez Rosales National Park

Lago Todos Los Santos in Vincente Perez Rosales NP

The next day, I decided to visit the neighboring town of Frutillar. Frutillar is a little German inspired village located a short distance north of Puerto Varas, still along the lakeshore. The local bus cost $1 each way, so it was a nice place to take a cheap trip. The village is famous for its decidedly German architecture, as well as Teatro del Lago, a stunning theatre situated over Lago Llanquique. I spent some time wandering the streets and around the theatre; however, the town was mostly closed down as it was the off season so I didn’t find it especially interesting to visit. After about an hour and a half I headed back to Puerto Varas, where I had lunch before heading south to Puerto Montt.

Puerto Montt was also a $1 bus ride away, this time to the south and the Pacific Coast. The local bus arrived right to the bus terminal, which was very conveniently located along the shore in the downtown area. The city is much larger and industrial than Puerto Varas, and had a much more touristy atmosphere. There were tons of shopping malls and tourist shops in the downtown core, especially around the main plaza. There wasn’t anything especially appealing about the city, so I didn’t stay too long here either. I made my way back to Puerto Varas for dinner and ended up having a great conversation at my hostel with people from the UK, Germany, Austria, Peru, and Brazil until after 3 AM!

Since I was flying out in the afternoon, I didn’t have time to do anything else on my last day in Puerto Varas. I took the bus to Puerto Montt around noon and from there the bus to the airport for my flight to Punta Arenas – my first stop in Patagonia!

Santiago – The highly underrated capital of Chile

Santiago, Chile, is generally not at the top of any list of best cities, but I loved it. The city doesn’t really have any amazing sites nor is it very pretty, but it has some intangible spirit that makes it fantastic. The atmosphere of the city is addictive and draws you in. I regret only spending three days in the city, as it doesn’t do it justice.

I made it to Santiago after the short bus ride back from Valparaiso. I stayed in a hostel only a few metro stops from the bus station so it was really easy to get to. After I checked in and dropped off my stuff, I rushed to the centre for the 3 PM Tours4Tips walking tour, where I met up with another friend who I met in Bolivia that lives in Santiago. This tour went to all the traditional locations in central Santiago, such as La Moneda, the Ministry of Justice, the Plaza de Armas, and various central neighborhoods. When we reached La Moneda, the guide gave us a history of Chile and its coup d’état which occurred in the 1973. The country is still recovering from the decades of military rule under Pinochet, whose regime killed and tortured thousands. The tour ended soon after this talk, and my friend and I headed to her apartment to play Dutch Blitz and eat. Along the way we stopped at a sopaipilla stand, which is a disk of dough that’s deep fried and covered in sauces (spicy salsa and garlic sauce are the best). After playing cards we went to a sushi bar to have dinner which was a fantastic surprise after not having sushi in months.

Sopaipilla with spicy salsa and garlic sauce

The following morning I went to the 10 AM Tours4Tips walking tour, which went to the non-touristy parts of the city. This included visiting the various markets of the city, such as the Mercado Central seafood market, La Vega, and Little La Vega. After the markets we headed to the cemetery to hear the history of the city, see the grave of a local “animita,” and visit the grave of Salvador Allende, the president who was overthrown in the coup d’état in 73. Here again we had a history lesson about the past few decades. The tour ended here and I went with another person from the tour to have lunch at Mercado Central. The food here was spectacular – fresh seafood for reasonable prices. I had Machas a la Parmigiana, which was razor clams covered in parmesan cheese and baked. When we finished lunch we returned to the centre and parted ways, as I needed to return to my hostel. I attempted to go to Cerro San Cristobal a few hours later, but missed the last tram by 5 minutes. I had my second Chilean food staple on the way back though, the completo. This is a hot dog covered in generally obscene amounts of mayonnaise, avocado, and tomatoes. Thankfully the place I ate had a reasonable amount of all of the toppings so it was actually not too bad. Later I met up with my two friends again for cards that night and had more sopaipillas, before having to take the metro back to my hostel.

Fruit vendor posing for a photo in La Vega Market

My last day in Santiago was the busiest. In the morning I walked from my hostel to the Plaza de Armas to visit the history museum, which described the early history of the country until 1970. After visiting the museum I walked across the river to Little La Vega to buy a fresh cherimoya-mango juice in the market and then walked to Cerro San Cristobal. This hill is the largest in Santiago and has the best viewpoint of the city. Since it was the weekend, the tram to the top was double the price and extremely crowded, so I chose to walk to the top. It took about an hour but the view along the way wasn’t too bad. The views of the city and the mountains from the top, however, were spectacular. The city was weirdly smogless that day, so the whole skyline was visible under the clear sunny skies. After climbing back down I walked to another hill, Cerro Saint Lucia. This hill is much shorter but has a great viewpoint from the castle-like building located on the top. From here I walked back to my hostel, stopping in the parks and interesting places along the way. I went to the bus station a little early to meet up with my friend one last time and have a churrasco, which is the third popular Chilean food. This is a beef sandwich with tomato, avocado, and mayo (very popular on everything here). We parted ways just before my bus left and I got on my overnight bus to Puerto Varas, located in the south of Chile in the Lakes District.

Cherimoya-Mango smoothie from Little La Vega

Valparaíso – Seafood, seaports, and street art

Valparaiso, Chile, is a seaside city with an amazing spirit. The streets are covered in stunning murals and street art that blend beautifully with the colorful architceture that distinguishes the city from its neighbours. The city is alive with an energy that is hard not to get absorbed into.

I arrived in Valparaiso in the late afternoon after a totally-not-awful 26 hours on a bus from San Pedro de Atacama. I had hoped to break the trip up a bit but was behind schedule after spending too much time in Bolivia. Thankfully, Valpo made up for it with its amazing atmosphere (and oxygen content!). I took a far too expensive cab to my hostel, Hostel Jacaranda, located on Cerro Alegre, which is the heart of the tourist centre. The hostel is in a well maintained old colonial house in a perfect location for accessing the city. Many of the people staying there were staying long term to study Spanish, one of whom offered to show me around the city.

We walked around for about 2 hours, wandering through the streets looking at all the amazing murals and art pieces painted on the walls. The downtown area of the city is fairly small so it’s not hard to get from one end to the other, so long as you don’t mind walking uphill. After going through the Open Air Museum, which features each year’s winning art pieces, we arrived at Pablo Neruda’s home, which is now a museum. Unfortunately I didn’t get a chance to visit it when I was in Valpo, but I heard from many that it was amazing.

Samples of Valparaíso Street Art – Pablo Neruda

When we returned from the walk, I found a nice cafe for dinner since I hadn’t really eaten in a few days after the Uyuni food poisoning incident. I splurged on a 3 course meal of salad, grilled whitefish with a lemon sauce and mushroom risotto, and a chocolate mousse for dessert. It was probably one of the best meals I’ve ever had anywhere, and was only about $11 total.
The following morning I got up early to do the Tours4Tips free walking tour of the city, which started at 10 AM. The tours last 3 hours and take place in either English or Spanish, depending on your choice. The tour started in Plaza Sotomayor, the large plaza near the docks. It covered the history of the seaport, the colonial history, the financial district, and the two UNESCO World Heritage sites of Cerro Alegre and Cerro Concepcion. Along the way the guide talked about the history and symbolism in the street art which decorates the city, which I found really interesting. The tour is definitely a must do thing when visiting Valpo, especially since it’s based on donations!

The tour ended in the plaza near the docks, near a bunch of seafood restaurants, so obviously I ate at one. I had a 3 course meal which started with ceviche, then followed by fried sea bass and a not so good blue mousse (total price, $5). After lunch I went down to the docks to take a boat tour of the city, which went along the coast to give views of the city from the ocean as well as the large freighters in the harbor. For $5, it was quite a bargain.

When I finished I met up with a friend who I had met in Bolivia a few weeks prior who lives in Valpo. She took me first up an “ascensor” to a viewpoint of the city (ascensors are like elevators that go to the top of the many hills). After spending time at the top we headed to the flat part of the city to have some Chilean dishes. I ordered a personal sized Chorrillana, which is French fries covered in grilled onions, sausage, hot dogs, and steak. The pile was 4 inches deep and took up a full sized plate – I have no idea how a single person could eat one, I got full after a quarter. When we left I went back to the hostel and crashed for the night after the large plate of food.

The following morning I attempted to visit the cemetery before taking the bus to Santiago but it was closed. I attempted to take a public bus to the bus terminal, but since I didn’t know where it was exactly I missed the stop and ended up on top of a hill. Thankfully the driver took me to another bus (whose driver let me know when we were there) and I didn’t have to pay again. I got the next bus to Santiago and left about 30 minutes later.

Salar de Uyuni and San Pedro de Atacama- the world’s most gorgeous and inhospitable landscapes

Salar de Uyuni is probably Bolivia’s most famous tourist attraction, and for good reason. The area is located in Bolivia’s extreme southwest corner along the Chilean border. The Salar is the world’s largest salt flat, and is so white and flat it’s used to calibrate satellites! In order to visit the Salar and the stunning landscapes that surround it, you have to take a tour with a licensed guide. Most tours last for 3 days and 2 nights, with the option of ending in San Pedro de Atacama, just across the border into Chile.

I arrived in the little town of Uyuni at around 4 in the afternoon after taking a noon bus from Potosi. Once I found a cheap hotel for the night I went out in search for a good and reasonably priced tour agency. There are tons and tons of tour agencies in Uyuni, especially along the main street near the train station. A lot of agencies have had problems with drunk drivers so it’s best to get recommendations from other travelers or sites like tripadvisor before arriving in order to book with a good company. I used World White Travel, which was recommended to me by some friends that had used them a few weeks earlier (I’d recommend them as well). I paid 800 Bs(~$115 USD) for the 3d/2n tour with transfer to San Pedro de Atacama and a sleeping bag was included. Be sure to ask about the sleeping bag because neither place I stayed had heat it was really needed the second night. It is possible to bargain the price down a bit depending on your skills – I got 50 Bs for mentioning my friend paid 750 Bs for her tour, but others on my tour paid 850 Bs, so it’s always worth haggling a bit. All the tours are the same route and prices (except Red Planet, they are way more expensive but seemed to have really high quality services and English speaking guides from what I saw). All tours are conducted in Spanish by default unless you pay a lot more for English, and the quality of the guide seems to be mostly the same for everyone at the usual price range.
After booking, I had dinner at this amazing American-run pizza place in the Tonito Hotel, called Minuteman Pizza. The owner is from Boston and makes perfect American style pizza, which is impossible to find in South America. I had the Heart Attack special which is essentially a pizza shaped calzone stuffed with tons of meat. Every pizza also comes with a fresh salad, another impossibility in Bolivia. I chatted with the owner after eating and he ended up giving me a free piece of cake as a graduation present, which was awesome for breakfast the next morning before the tour began.

The tour started at 10 AM in the tour office, conveniently located around the corner from my hotel. Soon after I arrived, the American family I met in Potosi joined in the office as they had booked the same tour. I ran into them the previous evening when they were looking for a tour company and told them where I booked, so they joined so I could translate the tour (which sounds awful but was actually quite fun). Two German cousins joined our group and then we packed up the car and headed to the first stop with our driver/guide, Herman.
The first stop on every tour is the Train Cemetery, located on the edge of town. This is where the old and broken trains from the country have been put for decades, since Uyuni is the center of Bolivian railway. All the trains are rusted over but are solid enough to climb around on, which is pretty great for photos and stuff. The stop here is for about a half hour, which is really about all the time you need to see everything and take a bunch of pictures.

The second stop is the main attraction, Salar de Uyuni. We stopped first at a series of salt mounds set up for photos before continuing to a salt hotel for lunch. Just outside of the salt hotel were a giant salt statue for the Dakar Rally, which goes through the area, and a bunch of flags for every country that participates in the rally. Lunch was mediocre, but really every meal was and no company had anything different to eat – no one goes for the food anyway. At some point around this time we stopped at an “artisanal village” which sold generic tourist junk and some salt things but the stop was so short I barely remember it.
After lunch we headed to the middle of the Salar for more pictures, like the stereotypical “giant dinosaur” picture and general pics of the hexagons of salt. We then went to Isla Incahuasi, which is a giant cactus-filled “island” in the middle of the Salar. The place is called an island because the entire Salar used to be a sea, so it’s used to be an island. For some reason the island is full of giant cacti, which only grow 1 cm per year so they had to be really quite old. There’s a nice trail along the island with the option of going into a giant cave made of dead coral, which was really cool to go into. The island also had free bathrooms included in the ticket price (yay toilets!). When we finished at the island our driver took us back to the Salar for sunset, and we were seemingly the only group to do so, which was nice after spending the whole day with a bunch of other people who get into photos and are generally in the way. It was a bit too cloudy for a spectacular sunset, but it was still pretty.

Colin the Alpaca looking unamused at Salar

After sunset we drove another 2 hours to our hotel. The hotel was on the edge of the Salar and was completely made of salt. The floor was ground salt, the table and chairs of salt bricks, even the bed and end table were both made of salt (thankfully the bed had a real mattress and pillow!). Since we stayed for sunset on the Salar, we were the last group to arrive and as such we had no room to plug our phones/cameras in as there were only 2 power strips for the whole hotel. Most of us managed to get stuff charged during dinner or after and then we went to bed early in preparation for the 7 AM breakfast the following morning.

Breakfast was the standard Bolivian fare not worth talking about, so I won’t. We headed first to the Ollagüe volcano. Along the way we stopped at a tiny village cemetery with a nice view of the volcano before heading to the proper “mirador.” The mirador was a crazy maze of bizarre rock formations, all overshadowed by the distant volcano. The wind there was brutally cold and the air had a tinge of sulfur to it from the volcanic activity. We left the mirador after about an hour and went to the first of a series of lagoons with wild flamingos.

The Hedionda Lagoon was a stunning dark grey lagoon full of wild flamingos wading through thick black mud. The surrounding landscape of snow-capped mountains and barren hills combined with the general existence of flamingos really made the visit feel otherworldly. After spending a while here we moved on to the nearby Cachi Lagoon, where we also had lunch. It was insanely windy here but the view was spectacular. Here the water was a light green-blue color and there were even more flamingos than the previous hill. At this point the trip got a bit less fun for me as I started feeling the symptoms of food poisoning. Suffice it to say that that is not pleasant on a day spent entirely in a car.

I honestly don’t remember most of the trip involving the desert as I was trying to sleep and avoid vomiting (did not succeed), but felt moderately better by the time we arrived at the arbol de piedra, a large worn stone randomly sitting in the middle of a desert landscape. Not far from here was the day’s final stop, Laguna Colorada. This lagoon is a deep red color due to algae which live in the water. There were flamingos at this lagoon too, and the general area was gorgeous. However I started feeling awful again so I spent most of the visit laying in the car. We spent the night in one of the coldest places I’ve ever slept (this is why the sleeping bag is needed) and started really early the following morning. This hotel had electricity for only 2.5 hours and no heat.

The last day of the tour began at 5 AM with a sunrise trip to a geyser field. The amount of geysers shooting out of the ground and giant pits of bubbling mud was incredible. The weather was bitterly cold, though the steam from the geysers made for decent hand-warmers. We stayed here a bit longer than expected due to a second case of sickness in the group, but then moved on the the natural hot springs. This lagoon was volcanically heated and a small pool was placed next to it for visitors to enjoy the warm waters in such a cold place. Half of our group got into the waters to get warm while the rest of us took some pics and went back to the car and out of the wind. Once we left, we continued south toward the Chile-Bolivia border. We drove by the Salvador Dali desert, likely named for its similarity to his works. We didn’t spend much time here as we were running late for the transfer to San Pedro de Atacama. We had to skip Laguna Verde because of that, though we got to see it driving by. We barely made it to the transfer in time, and thankfully the Bolivian exit process was super easy so we didn’t miss it. There was a 15 Bs”exit tax” to leave the country, which is clearly a scam because I only had 6 Bs on me and he took it and shoved it in is pocket anyway and said good enough.

Crossing the border into Chile is like crossing into a parallel universe. Right at the border the road goes from bumpy gravel to perfect asphalt and road signs. The trip to San Pedro de Atacama only took about an hour, and the Chilean border control was fairly easy to get through (just don’t have fruits or vegetables!). Right after we arrived the German guys in my Uyuni tour and I booked a tour of Valle de la Luna for later that afternoon before going to our separate hostels.
San Pedro de Atacama was so much warmer than Bolivia it was incredible. When I finally found my hostel I had to change out of pants and jackets to shorts and a T-shirt because it was so hot. It was a welcome change. The tour for Valle de la Luna left about 3 hours after we arrived, which was just enough time to charge everything up and walk around town a bit.

Valle de la Luna is located just outside of San Pedro and is an absolute must for anyone visit the town. I paid 9000 CLP ($13) for a 4 hour tour in English and Spanish. The guide was great and took us trekking around the valley for a few hours before watching the sunset over the Andes mountains. He described the history of the area and the various minerals in the valley and volcanic activity that shaped it. The views from the top of the peaks in the valley were amazing. By sunset, we were at the main viewpoint which allowed for a perfect view of the mountains for sunset. The colors gradually changed from pink to red to purple before the sun finally went below the horizon. When we returned to SPdA, I went back to my hostel to get some rest before the 24 hour bus journey that was to occur the following morning.

First thing in the morning I went to the bus station and bought a salon-cama ticket to Santiago ($60, 24 hours) and then had breakfast, which was my first meal since being sick on the Uyuni tour. By the time I had finished the meal and bought some supplies for the bus ride, it was time to head to the station and go to Santiago.
(The bus was actually quite comfortable, other than the baby in the seat next to me that screamed the entire night).

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