South America (Days 1 & 2)

January 14

The world is a book and those who do not travel read only one page. ~ St. Augustine

In 2003, I almost died of an intestinal blockage when I was on a mountain in Chile, filming a segment for ‘Scientific American Frontiers.’ ~ Alan Alda

[Little Ole signature photo representing the trip with Orsono Volcano in the Chilean Lake District as the background . . . ]

Our first cruise since the summer of 2019 when we went to Norway. My fondest memory of this cruise will be that I didn’t gain a single pound, a singular accomplishment in the world of cruising. It took us a full day to get there: From Minneapolis, to Atlanta, to Bogota, Colombia, to Santiago, Chile. The trip added five new counties to my repertoire: Colombia, Chile, Falkland Islands, Argentina, and Uruguay. I also added a couple of other firsts. I now have to answer the medical question “have you fallen down?” with a yes, twice. The first time was on the last week of the cruise while on the top deck star gazing (I still haven’t seen the Southern Cross) when I tripped over the barrier to the bocce ball court and fell flat on my face, bracing my left hand to protect my phone and will now do shoulder rehab. The last was in the Minneapolis airport when I should have known better than to use an escalator when overloaded with luggage. I took a lovely tumble that chewed up both shins. I made it home and am now on full reclusiveness at home in recovery. We are postponing today’s book club gathering until next weekend – even for lifelong Minnesotans, it was decided that a temperature of 40 degrees below zero wind chill would best be endured in the comfort of one’s own home (and in my case to avoid further injury). And now, our report . . . ~ Me

December 20

Not all those who wander are lost. ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

[As usual, the Super graciously volunteered to be the perspective model in our photos. Here in MPLS enroute to Atlanta on the first leg of the journey . . . ]

It can hardly be a coincidence that no language on earth has ever produced the expression, ‘As pretty as an airport.‘ ~ Douglas Adams

[In the Atlanta airport for leg two of the journey to Bogota, Colombia . . . ]

Books are the plane, and the train, and the road. They are the destination, and the journey. They are home. ~ Anna Quindlen

[Readying for the third and final leg . . . ]

Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. ~ Mark Twain

[To Santiago, Chile . . . ]

December 21

The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes. ~ Marcel Proust

[Atrium of the Santiago Marriott Hotel . . . ]

Jet lag is for amateurs. ~  Dick Clark

[Little Ole came out to celebrate our arrival . . . ]

Travel far enough, you meet yourself. ~ David Mitchell

[Santiago has a population of 5.6 million and they all passed through the airport this morning!]

I think you travel to search and you come back home to find yourself there. ~ Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

[And a Merry Christmas from Santiago . . . ]

Travel makes one modest. You see what a tiny place you occupy in the world. ~ Gustave Flaubert

[The hotel patio . . . ]

Why do you go away? So that you can come back. ~ Terry Pratchett

[The hotel restaurant . . . ]

Never did the world make a queen of a girl who hides in houses and dreams without traveling. ~ Roman Payne

[Dinner at said hotel restaurant . . . ]

But that’s the glory of foreign travel, as far as I am concerned. I don’t want to know what people are talking about. I can’t think of anything that excites a greater sense of childlike wonder than to be in a country where you are ignorant of almost everything. Suddenly you are five years old again. You can’t read anything, you have only the most rudimentary sense of how things work, you can’t even reliably cross a street without endangering your life. Your whole existence becomes a series of interesting guesses. ~ Bill Bryson

[The view from our hotel room . . . ]

I am not the same having seen the moon shine on the other side of the world. ~ Mary Anne Radmacher

[View from our hotel room side window . . . ]

There are no foreign lands. It is the traveler only who is foreign. ~ Robert Louis Stevenson

[Our first bus tour, cruising Santiago . . . ]

If you reject the food, ignore the customs, fear the religion, and avoid the people, you might better stay home. ~ James A. Michener

[The Super organizes her touring stuff . . . ]

We travel, initially, to lose ourselves; and we travel, next to find ourselves. ~ Pico Iyer

[Our tour guide, in seasonal antlers for the upcoming holiday . . . ]

Do we really want to travel in hermetically sealed popemobiles through the rural provinces of France, Mexico and the Far East, eating only in Hard Rock Cafes and McDonalds? ~ Anthony Bourdain

[Our first objet jour – our hotel . . . ]

Make voyages. Attempt them. There’s nothing else. ~ Tennessee Williams

[Gran Torre Costanera, previously known as Costanera Center Torre 2, and also known as El Costanera (The Costanera) by the locals, and previously known as Torre Gran Costanera, is a 62-story skyscraper in Santiago, Chile. It is the tallest building in South America. The tower was designed by Chilean architects Alemparte Barreda & Asociados, the Argentine architect Cesar Pelli and the Canadian company Watt International. ~ Wikipedia]

Travel brings wisdom only to the wise. It renders the ignorant more ignorant than ever. ~ Joe Abercrombie

[Plaza de Armas is the main square of Santiago. It is the centerpiece of the initial layout of Santiago, which has a square grid pattern. This urban design was accomplished by Pedro de Gamboa, which was appointed by Pedro de Valdivia in 1541. ~ tripadvisor.co[m]

Self-consciousness kills communication. ~ Rick Steves

[Christmas in the plaza . . . ]

It is always sad to leave a place to which one knows one will never return. Such are the melancholies du voyage: perhaps they are one of the most rewarding things about traveling. ~ Gustave Flaubert

[Pedro Gutiérrez de Valdivia or Valdiva; April 17, 1497 – December 25, 1553) was a Spanish conquistador and the first royal governor of Chile. ~ Wikipedia]

Every one of a hundred thousand cities around the world had its own special sunset and it was worth going there, just once, if only to see the sun go down. ~ Ryu Murakami

[STGO = Santiago . . . ]

There is strange comfort in knowing that no matter what happens today, the Sun will rise again tomorrow. ~ Aaron Lauritsen

[Perfect for kids . . . ]

I saw in their eyes something I was to see over and over in every part of the nation- a burning desire to go, to move, to get under way, anyplace, away from any Here. They spoke quietly of how they wanted to go someday, to move about, free and unanchored, not toward something but away from something. I saw this look and heard this yearning everywhere in every states I visited. Nearly every American hungers to move. ~ John Steinbeck

[Of course you already know the description . . . ]

Travel is glamorous only in retrospect. ~ Paul Theroux

[Our tour guide in photo center explaining all you can see in the plaza . . . ]

Anyone who needs more than one suitcase is a tourist, not a traveler. ~ Ira Levin

[The building on the right is the seat of the municipality of Santiago – the city hall – at the corner of the 21 de Mayo Street. It was built 1785-1790 by the italian architect Joaquín Toesca. First it was the seat of the cabildo, the colonial administrative council of the city, while it also served as the prison of the city. ~ panoramastreetline.com]

If I’m an advocate for anything, it’s to move. ~ Anthony Bourdain

[With City Hall as the background . . . ]

No one realizes how beautiful it is to travel until he comes home and rests his head on his old, familiar pillow. ~ Lin Yutang

[A tree not native to Alexandria, Minnesota . . . ]

That’s the place to get to—nowhere. One wants to wander away from the world’s somewheres, into our own nowhere. ~ D.H. Lawrence

Every hundred feet the world changes. ~ Roberto Bolaño

[The Palacio de la Real Audiencia de Santiago is a building located in the north central village of the Plaza de Armas in Santiago, Chile. The building dates back to 1808 and houses, since 1982, the National History Museum of Chile. ~ Wikipedia

The Palacio de la Real Audiencia de Santiago, which today houses the Museo Histórico Nacional (MHN – National History Museum of Chile). It was built 1804-07 by Juan Goycolea for the Royal Courts of Justice of Chile. Later it also served as the seat of the government of Chile. ~ panoramastreetline.com]

We can’t jump off bridges anymore because our iPhones will get ruined. We can’t take skinny dips in the ocean because there’s no service on the beach and adventures aren’t real unless they’re on Instagram. Technology has doomed the spontaneity of adventure and we’re helping destroy it every time we Google, check-in, and hashtag. ~ Jeremy Glass

[The Metropolitan Cathedral of Santiago . . . ]

You don’t even know where I’m going. I don’t care. I’d like to go anywhere. ~ John Steinbeck

[The Super fronting a flock of lupine . . . ]

The saddest journey in the world is the one that follows a precise itinerary. Then you’re not a traveler. You’re a f@@king tourist. ~ Guillermo del Toro

[Washingtonia filifera, the desert fan palm, California fan palm, or California palm, is a flowering plant in the palm family Arecaceae, native to the far southwestern United States and Baja California, Mexico. Growing to 15–20 m tall by 3–6 m broad, it is an evergreen monocot with a tree-like growth habit. ~ Wikipedia]

There are two kinds of travel: first class and with children. ~ Robert Benchley

[Simon Bolivar fountain and monument to American Liberty at Plaza de Armas Square . . . ]

Did you ever notice that the first piece of luggage on the carousel never belongs to anyone? ~ Erma Bombeck

[Again, the cathedral . . . ]

The farther you go, however, the harder it is to return. The world has many edges, and it’s easy to fall off. ~ Anderson Cooper

[Inside the cathedral, where we were allowed a quick photo op . . . ]

Men read maps better than women because only men can understand the concept of an inch equaling a hundred miles. ~ Roseanne Barr

[Now this is an urban street as urban streets should be . . . ]

Travel does not exist without home….If we never return to the place we started, we would just be wandering, lost. ~ Josh Gates

[Another wonderful urban street . . . ]

Only it seems to me that once in your life before you die you ought to see a country where they don’t talk in English and don’t even want to. ~ Thornton Wilder

[Our tour bus. I know that because that’s what the sign says . . . ]

The only way I knew how to live the best day ever was on an expedition. ~ Hendri Coetzee

[The Former National Congress Building (ex Congreso Nacional) is the former home of the Chilean Congress. Congress met in this building in central Santiago until Salvador Allende’s socialist government was overthrown by Augusto Pinochet’s military coup d’etat on September 11, 1973. During the Pinochet dictatorship, Congress was moved to new premises in Valparaiso; the old building was declared a national monument in 1976 and between 1990 and 2006 housed the ministry of foreign affairs. The Senate moved its offices in Santiago to this building in December 2000. On January 26, 2006 the Chamber of Deputies recovered its old offices. ~ Wikipedia]

I heard an airplane passing overhead. I wished I was on it. ~ Charles Bukowski

[Continuing my urban street theme . . . ]

The best traveler is one without a camera. ~ Kamand Kojouri

[Close up of the plaza statue a few pics below . . . ]

I wonder if the ocean smells different on the other side of the world. ~ J.A. Redmerski

[See explanation above . . . ]

You can’t understand a city without using its public transportation system. ~ Erol Ozan

[The official government building, seat to the President of the Republic, is generally known as La Moneda. It also hosts the Home Office, the General Secretariat of the Presidency, the General Secretariat of the Government and the Ministry of Social Development. ~ thesingular.com]

It’s in those quiet little towns, at the edge of the world, that you will find the salt of the earth people who make you feel right at home. ~ Aaron Lauritsen

[Statue of Pedro Aguirre Cerda located at the Plaza de la Constitución. ~ Wikipedia]

[Plaza de la constitución (Constitution Square), Santiago de Chile. Occupying a full square block in the heart of the civic district of Santiago, Chile. It is located in front of the northern facade of the Palacio de la Moneda and is surrounded by other government buildings such as those housing the Ministry of Finance, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Justice, Banco Central de Chile and the Intendencia de Santiago. ~ deviantart.com]

When you travel, remember that a foreign country is not designed to make you comfortable. It is designed to make its own people comfortable. ~ Clifton Fadiman

It is better to fill your head with useless knowledge than no knowledge at all. ~ Jim Hinckley

[DIEGO PORTALES: (June 16, 1793 – June 6, 1837) was a Chilean statesman and entrepreneur. As a minister of president José Joaquín Prieto Diego Portales played a pivotal role in shaping the state and government politics in the 19th century, delivering with the Constitution of 1833 the framework of the Chilean state for almost a century. Portales influential political stance included unitarianism, presidentialism and conservatism which led to consolidate Chile as a constitutional authoritarian republic with democracy restricted to include only upper class men. ~ deviantart.com]

He didn’t really like travel, of course. He liked the idea of travel, and the memory of travel, but not travel itself. ~ Julian Barnes

Traveling is a brutality. It forces you to trust strangers and to lose sight of all that familiar comfort of home and friends. You are constantly off balance. ~ Cesare Pavese

[An outdoor craft fair – the Super alleges she didn’t buy anything there . . . ]

Leave home, leave the country, leave the familiar. Only then can routine experience—buying bread, eating vegetables, even saying hello—become new all over again. ~ Anthony Doerr

[Adios, from Santiago . . . ]

Everything I did, all my actions, all of the problems I had I dedicate to God and to Chile, because I kept Chile from becoming Communist. ~ Augusto Pinochet

Chile has done a lot to rid itself of poverty, especially extreme poverty, since the return to democracy. But we still have a ways to go toward greater equity. This country does not have a neoliberal economic model anymore. We have put in place a lot of policies that will ensure that economic growth goes hand in hand with social justice. ~ Michelle Bachelet

Up Next: South America . . .