Chillin' at the Chilean beach

One of the closest/best summer vacation spots for Santiguans [I looked up online what to call someone who lives in Santiago] are Valparaíso and Viña del Mar. They are two beach cities only about 2 hours away and are right next to each other on the coast. Reñaca beach is said to be "the most beautiful beach" and is part of Viña. For a little weekend trip my friends Natalie, Meredith, Rachael, and I decided to check out these places before it got cold. For those of you who didn't realize it, the seasons are opposite here from the US so I came during summer and I'll get back to California for summer too! Best of both hemispheres woop woop! 

Here's a view of Renaca beach

From the hill where our hostel was in Valparaiso

Anyway, our weekend getaway wasn't nearly as eventful as the other trips I've gone on, but that was a good thing because we needed some good R&R from the first couple weeks of class [Ok, maybe we just wanted an excuse to go on another vacation]. The cab driver ripped us off a couple luka* from the bus station in Valpo to our hostel, but we were in joyful spirits because it was sunny! We dumped our stuff in our room and immediately left to go to Reñaca. On the way to the bus station we found tons of awesome graffiti so naturally we had to take lots of photos of it. 
*luka means $1,000 Chilean pesos

There are tons of little buses that go between the beach cities so we hopped on one of those, which wound up being a very exhilarating experience. It seemed like the bus drivers were racing each other and having a competition for who could make their ride more petrifying/roller coaster-like. But my friends and I were loving it because we thrive on weird/scary things now. 

Of course when we got to Reñaca we all had to use the bathroom [tmi??] and headed to McDonald's since they are universally recognized for having clean, nice restrooms. We all got satisfyingly delicious coffee drinks there, which had manjar in them!!!! Manjar is the Chilean version of caramel, but DON'T call it dulce de leche. That's what Argentineans call it and there's a debate between Chile and Argentina about which one is better [even though they are basically the exact same thing]. Also, random comment but I thought it was hilarious when the cashier rang up the "Frappe [like frappucino] Manjar" because the register abbreviated it to "Frapman". Don't know why I found that so funny, but I'm pretty sure the girl and guy working behind the counter thought I was crazy. 


After the manjar rejuvenation, we walked out to the beach and even though it was cold, Nat, Mer, and I decided to go ahead and strip down to our bikinis. There were maybe 5 other people on the entire beach so it was kinda obvious that it wasn't the time to be tanning, but we didn't care. Rae was way too cold though and just laid down huddled on her towel. 

Once the sun finally did start peeking through the marine layer, Mer and I went to go test out the water and were surprised by a wave and wound up soaked. Chile is known for having cold water so we were chilly after that. But not too long afterwards we went to actually go swimming and it was very refreshing. I tried not to compare the Chilean beach to the ones I went to with Abby in Rio because Reñaca didn't even stand a chance, but it was still a beach and the sun was out so we had a good time. That is until we realized we were all getting extremely sun burned thanks to the fact that there's no ozone layer over Chile. We also noticed that we were getting hungry so we packed up our beach gear and got onto a bus back to Viña, did a little street shopping, and then were convinced to eat at a restaurant named "Africa" [kind of a Rainforest Cafe wannabe, but some of the wildlife inside was literally just stuffed animals]. Natalie and Meredith split a salmon a lo pobre and Rachael and I halfsiesed a lomo a lo pobre and it was soooo delicious!! I can't remember if I've explained this typical Chilean dish before so I will now. It's some kind of meat [salmon, lomo--like steak, churassco--like carne asada, etc.] with french fries, onions and eggs. Nom nom nommmm. It's one of my new favorite food groups. Yes, I love it so much that it's an entire group.

Feast your eyes on that!

We also got heaps of camaron con queso [shrimp with cheese] empanadas 

That night we practically forced ourselves to go out because we were all in pain, especially Nat, from the sunburns. We alternated using the Aloe Vera as we got ready and then went to go find a club. The hostel we were staying in was way up on the hill facing the ocean so it was about a 15-20 minute walk to the club area. In Valpo there's a street that's lined with them though so that made it easy to find one. We didn't want to pay to go in [duh] so we found a free one and went inside. We were the only gringas in there, which was perfect, and the best part is that they didn't play any American music!! You have no idea how annoying it is to be in South America and listening to English club music. We would much rather listen to Spanish music while we're here, of course.

Wherever I go, I always find a cat to love on

My face covered with sand after waking up haha

The following day was spent once again at Reñaca, but it was colder than the day before and we were super tired so we took a nap on the beach for a while [I fell asleep face first in the sand]. After our little siestas, we spent a while trying to find cool street shops in both Reñaca and in Valpo, but didn't have any luck because it was Sunday and most places are pretty dead on Sundays. However, when we were on our way to the bus station later that day we stumbled upon TONS of street venders, which was annoying because we didn't have time to look at any of their stuff since we were already running super late to catch the bus. But we did make time to stop and get some churros rellenos con majar [churros filled with majar!!! Churros here a little different though cause they aren't covered in cinnamon sugar--still amazing though. The best one I've had was in San Antonio, Chile. It was filled with manjar and then dipped in chocolate. Heaven in the form of food.]

Mer took a photo of us asleep on the sand

Me, Natalie, Meredith, and Rachael

On the way home we slept and talked and at one point Mer, Rae, and I were belting Bohemian Rhapsody and other passengers told us to be quiet. Lolz. And that was the end of our beach weekend. 


Then I found 10 luka [that equals $20 usd]. 
Just kidding.