Happy New Year!

Leah and I ended up spending an amazing week in Vina Del Mar and getting amazing guided tours of Valparaiso, Vina, and Isla Negra from our friend Dominic.

New Years Eve was absolutely incredible. Imagine being on a beach with 50 km of coastline and about every 3 km fireworks were going off. They were all in sync with each other and better than any 4th of July display I have ever seen. After that Leah, Dominic, our other friend Carol and I proceeded to squeeze on an already packed bus to get to downtown Valparaiso. We had to shove dozens of people out of the way, but we were cut throat and sober while they were all wasted already.

When we got there, there were more people in one space then I have ever seen in my life. Everyone was just running around and being crazy, I honestly don´t know what we did from the span of 1 am to 9, we just wandered around and people watched, with a little dancing inbetween.

We slept the entire day of New Years and woke up the next day ready to be tourists. We walked the beaches of Pina and checked out a couple of museums, it was obviously a cultural experience. Our last day we spent at Isla Negra and saw the house of renowned poet Pablo Neruda, it was absolutely incredible. He built his entire house to be like that of a ship, even though he was completely terrified of sailing. He collected all sorts of things, including giant beetles from all over the world, which completely gave me the creeps. We ended our day by sitting on the rocky beaches and watching the huge waves roll in. It was absolutely incredible. We LOVED this area of Chile and insist anyone who visits goes to this area.