Sun, Sand and Fingertip Blisters

Santiago, Chile
We arrived in Santiago Chile at 4am local time this morning (Good Friday) after an epic journey by plane, train, and automobile (and boat) to get here from Margarita Island, Venezuela.

We were on Margarita Island for 8 days primarily to meet up with our good friends Cam and Cynthia. They were there on their holiday to enjoy the beautiful beach and the great windsurfing conditions along with some other avid Alberta windsurfers. We really enjoyed getting to know this diverse group of people. Ages, occupations, and personality types varied considerably but the atmosphere was just plain fun. The people we got to know and hang out with were definitely the highlight of the week. It made it very difficult to say goodbye.

Windsurfing was more of a mixed bag. Both Mary and I gave windsurfing a try. After a few days Mary decided that the beach was more fun while I persisted and was rewarded with nicely blistered fingertips (I also had a really fun time learning but the fingertips make a better story). Have you ever had blisters on the ends of all 8 fingertips? They´re both tender and insensitive all at the same time. Rub them gently and they feel like they´re covered in Saran. Try to open a bottle of water and they demand that you stop. I made the mistake of using an alcohol based hand sanitizer on them and screamed like a girl. I got this condition by repetitively pulling up the sail and holding onto the boom of the windsurfing rig with salt water softened hands.

This last week is known as Semana Santa (Holy Week) and it is an excuse to have a big party. Each day the beach and the first 15 meters of ocean would fill with people enjoying the sunshine and many, many beverages. At first its pretty interesting because there are just so many people to watch (we´ll show you pictures soon) but after a day or two we started to long for the quiet beaches we´ve enjoyed for the majority of our trip.

The only other remarkable thing was the food we enjoyed on the beach. We were able to set up a tab with a bar/restaurant right on the beach and they kept us supplied with food and drinks throughout the week as we lounged on the beach. We are unaccustomed to such luxury. Our favorite drink was an iced coffee drink reminiscent of a Tim Horton´s Ice Cap.