Escucha Familia!

Well well. The technical reason why Nicolas and I stayed in Santiago for so long was that he needed to renew his German Passport. The idiot... i mean Nicolai decided the best day to check when his German passport expired was the day before he flew to Santiago... nice dude! Well in Chile he realized that both for Bolivia and Brasil he needed to get a visa. But for Germans a visa was not required. Anyway we had to stay another week in Santiago after La Serena and get that done.

And so we did. And so my birthday came up, and so did my grandfather's 90th birthday celebration, and so did all my brothers and parents come together. My sister Carolina flew in with Mateo my nephew, my brother Gonzalo, and the dear Diannita. Never have I ever celebrated my birthday in Chile and evenmore never have I ever celebrated my birthday with my entire familia! We did it in style with a lot of food and a lot of more familia from my dad and my mom's side.

For my grandfather we had an even bigger gathering. His four kids were finally all together again and a lot of their family too. That is all my family, a whole lot of my cousins, all of my mom's brothers and sister, and extended family, dogs, nannies, etc, etc. We all enjoyed the party very much and it was absolutely fabulous to see everyone in such high spirits even for a brief moments. The part that complimented our trip with the Nickster was that we were able to see all of them and receive all their support as we were embarking on our trip beginnning with Lima in Peru. Gracias mi Familia Querida.

La Serena y Pisco Elqui

Despues del inovidable Valparaiso viajamos con Nicolas a La Serena. De La Serena viajamos al Valle Elqui donde se hace el Pisco Chileno. Aca no voy a empesar la discusion del Pisco y de cual es mejor y como se prepara y todo eso. El Pisco es rico por lo que es y me gusta tomarlo cuando comparto con amigos, compadres, y nuevos amigos.

La Serena se encuentra al lado de la ciudad de Coquimbo. Ambas me dieron la impresion de ser analogas a Vina del Mar y Valparaiso respectivamente, en el que los cerros coloridos de Coquimbo me hacian recordar los del Valpo, y lo plano que es La Serena como asi es Vina. La Serena es le ciudad de donde viene mi abuelo Pizarro y sus hermanos. Tengo mi Tio Federico, tio abuelo, que vive en La Serena y que nos ha recibido con mucho carino. Tambien fuimos afortunado de qudarnos en la casa de mi amigo Felipe Lira que quedava al lado de la playa.

Y asi con toda el apoyo familiar y de amigos nos fuimos en bus al precioso Valle del Elqui. Visitamos Vicuna donde se hace el Pisco Capel y esta el observatorio de Mamalluca de donder vimos entero el Milky Way, Jupiter y tres satelites, y cuantas constelaciones. Tambien estuvimos en Pisco Elqui que es un poco mas retirado y mas tranquilo, ahi nos quedamos en un camping precioso al lado del Rio. En fin fuimos a Montegrande la casa de la profesora poeta y Premio Noble Gabriela Mistral.

El Sabado en la noche fuimos con Marcela que nos cozino muy rico y Nicolas a Coquimbo a carretiar. Fuimos a un bar reggae que tocava musica rockera de todo tipo de las buena como Pink Floyd, the Cure, the Clash, etc. Luego fuimos a otra discoteca rockera donde la cerveza estava bien barata, buena, musica y buenas chicas. El resto es historia de borrachos...

VALPO!!

Holla!!

Ricardo and I have been a bit, meaning a lot, behind on our entries about our adventures. So here is our written account of some of the events of the great city of Valparaiso! First night in to the city we were planning to spend one night with the brother of a good friend back in Washington D.C. (VITO!). Vito was actually our guide the last time that Ricardo and I visited Valpo. Since there was a bit of an Asado happening at Nico´s house (Vito`s brother) we got to meet a lot of Valpo natives. Every person we talked to said that it`s impossible to spend only one night in Valpo! So we said Ya Po, Huevon! One night turned into 3 and we got a chance to drink in the great beauty that is Valpo! Every nook and cranny surrounding Nico´s house is more interesting than the next. When you mix a lugar like Valpo with lots of artistic history, Pablo Neruda for example, with a giant port, add waves and waves of internationals, great seafood, and lots of students looking for cheap housing you get: paint splashed on every wall, graffiti that would be a crime to paint over with one color, stencils galore, and an ever repeating song about Valpo bursting out of every window at some point in the night on the weekend ("... la plaza de la Victoria ehhh es un centro social...").
If you go to Chile, Valpo is 2 hours west of Santiago...GO!!!!
Love, Nick and Ric