Cat's New Adventures : Family Visit Chile (February 2020)

My family took a long flight from the U.K. to Chile landing in Santiago, Joaquin and I meet them at the airport and then the tours began. My Mum and Dad had no idea what we would being doing so everything was a surprise.

Here are all the things we got up to with my family:

Santiago

We stayed a few days in Santiago, we had a personal tour from Joaquin and walked around the city sightseeing.

They tried Mote con Huesillo (it’s a kind of drink with peach and wheat).

Sky Costanera centre

This is the tallest building in South America, so we went up to the top to see the view of the city. As we went up in the evening we could see the city from the day, watch a beautiful sunset and see the city at night.

Wine tour

This was one of the best parts of their trip because of course they got to drink wine. We visited the Vino Concha y Toro which makes the Casillero del Diablo wines.

We had a tour of the winery, learnt about how they make the wine, the story behind the devil, tried the grapes and of course tasted the wine!

Monty enjoying the wine.

Antofagasta

It was off on a flight up to Antofagasta for our families to meet for the first time in person. We had a Chilean BBQ, a little different from an English one. Hannah and Dawud joined us too.

Beach time

Spent some relaxing time at the beach. Drinking more wine of course. Here in Chile, you can buy wine in a 2 litre bottle.

Astronomical tour

We had our own private tour picking us up and heading out into the desert. We stopped at the hand of the desert, a piece of art in the middle of nowhere!

They set up the telescopes and we spent the night looking at the stars and learnt more about our universe. We got to see the southern cross which you can only see from the Southern Hemisphere which my parents were so excited about seeing.

Wedding

Of course, this was the best day of their trip as they got to watch Joaquin and I get married. It was a stressful day leading up to the ceremony everyone pitched in to help transport things, clean up the beach and assemble the decorations. Time for the fun to start, my dad was there to walk me down the aisle, delicious food was eaten, speeches were given, first dance, everyone dancing the night way, cake cutting, games were played and party hats came out for even more dancing. My parents said it was the best wedding they had ever been too and they’ve been to a lot of weddings, so it much have been a good one!

Observatory

It was a late finish to the wedding and the next day was an early start. There was a big group of us from my family and Joaquin’s heading to the observatory for a tour. Of course, Joaquin’s family did the tour in Spanish and we had a tour in English.

It was very fascinating for then to see such a huge telescope and learn more about space. My mum loves space but this telescope is a lot bigger than hers at home.

City tour

I had to work for the day at school but Joaquin took my family on a tour of Antofagasta. They visited the clock tower, a cemetery (they don’t bury people in the ground they build tombs above ground one on top of the other and then seal them off once occupied. Family’s usual have a plot and are buried together), La Portada, Tropic of Capricorn, a visit to my school to see where I worked, my dad made friends with the music teacher and they were playing music together.

Hike up the hill

I got the morning off work to take my family on their last outing of their trip before they had to fly back to England. It was up to the anchor on a small but steep hill for a little hike to see the best views of Antofagasta.