We did our usual thing in Santiago, our latest Capital city – take from it what suits us best as a family.

We are truly in our stride when it comes to identifying and narrowing down what we want to do in such a vastly sprawling city with limited time available to us. First up, we’re not that bothered about the usual highlights you find on any ‘must see’ list – ie the churches, the historic public buildings (unless they’re exceptionally beautiful), the best bars etc. We generally look to fit in a hike to the best view of the city, some/ lots of art, be that galleries, sculpture parks or street art, any big green spaces and we also like to visit the most interesting neighbourhoods , whether that’s for the food, the culture, the atmosphere or the independent stores. Playgrounds always figure as do vegan and vegetarian eateries. We love a good metro and bus system but if you are going to see the city at it’s best you should walk as much as you can.

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Santiago ticked every box – Great metro, great public spaces, friendly people, vegan options and a sense of safety (with the caveat of making sure you stay alert and make the right choices regarding the ares to visit). We loved the colour, sights and sounds, the street vendors, good coffee and lots of outdoor art. The main hike attraction was easily accessible through an interesting neighborhood. We did miss out on a major kids experiential science musuem as it was labour day but we have done several of these on our trips to other countries and so we know we’ve experienced similar stuff before. Being in the city around that time wasn’t a hindrance, on the contrary it allowed us to see how the workers fight for their rights. We saw several marches/ protests/ events across the country. When they get a day off it seems, the Chilean worker marches to remind everyone to treat them right.

We also found things were made easy for us as foreign, poor Spanish speaking tourists too. From the metro ‘BIP’ card system to hiring a car with a local firm – doing it from outside Chile via the web is complicated and SO expensive. NOT when you’re here, easy peasy! So much so that it didn’t really feel so ‘oh my word we’re in South America!’, no, Santiago felt like any big European city but with better weather! We loved it! The women are beautiful and the men are short (nice for me being a shortarse too) and they all have a good head of hair, not a baldy in sight! They do however also have the spare tire to carry around their midriffs, with many men and women being nice and chunky. Not a surprise really, when you read about must eat Chilean street food, top of the list is an Empanada (a pasty with more pastry than filling, Sopaipilla (basically deep fried dough)  and Completo (hot dogs on white buns) with all the trimmings.