Happy birthday to me. :-) I must admit I never thought I'd be spending a birthday in Santiago. How nice to be spending my birthday in ho wearer for the first time ever! This is what a summer birthday feels like then.
Woke up to a lovely arrangement on the bathroom mirror from Nat wishing me happy birthday. Far better than any card (you know how I hate cards!) although I did think a psychopath stalker had broken into our room in the night to wish me happy birthday.
After some good face time sessions with Mum and Dad and Caroline and Dave we head to the Costanera Centre shopping mall as we need to but some warmer clothes for the next couple of weeks in La Paz, Lake Titicaca, Cusco and the Inca Trail where the temperature is a good 20 degrees cooler!
We have a walk through the lovely Bella Artes park on the way to the Metro. Thee are quite a lot of parks in Santiago which is nice.
We arrive at the Costanera Centre which is a huge business and commercial complex that includes a six-floor shopping mall, the Gran Torre Santiago (the huge tower pictures that reminds me of the new World Trade Centre building in NYC). At 300 metres and 64 floors it is the tallest building in Latin America and the second tallest in the Southern Hemisphere after Australia's Q1 on the Gold Coast. Fact.
We have a very productive shop hitting our old friends H&M, Zara and Gap and getting some great bargains. The summer sales are on which in addition to it being pretty cheap already = BARGAINS! It's a great mall - the largest one in South Amercia. We even see thin people with half decent fashion sense in here which is a first for Santiago.
The museum that we haven't visited by our hotel. We have enjoyed walking past it every day though.
After Nat's customary nap and my customary sit on the roof/balcony we have a very quick face time with Eric and Y'ster and Hayley and Jacob then head out. Our first stop on birthday night out is the lovely W Hotel for drinks. Unfortunately the bar on the 24th floor is closed until March for some reason. Bit disappointing as we don't get such a good view of the sunset but the terrace bar on the 4th floor is also very good.
Nat perusing the wine list.
BIG thank you to Caroline and Dave for our gorgeous bottle of red! Very thoughtful and even more appreciated x
Birthday mole.
After we head back to a restaurant literally straight across the road from our hotel called El Toro. It's highly recommended by the wallpaper guide and as per usual with their recommendations it is a fantastic find. We would have walked past this all week without even thinking to go in if it wasn't for the wallpaper guide as it doesn't look much in the day, just like a normal cafe but at night it comes alive.
Really cool restaurant.
The food is fantastic. I go for the most expensive steak on the menu coupled with dauphinois potatoes and Nat has the quesadillas. Best place we have eaten here and all for a grand old price of £22 so as the wine was so cheap Caroline and Dave have also treated us to dinner too!!! Thank you again!
We are pretty tired and have an early start tomorrow so make the long walk across the road home.
One last look on the roof before bed and we see an absolutely huge fire across the city with a cacophony of fire engines. It dies down after a while though so they must be getting it under control. Good job we didn't do what I wanted to do and go and see it!! You know how I love a good fire.
All in all a great birthday. Although I must admit every day feels like a birthday at the moment!
PS I feel like I gave the wrong impression of the pollution and smog in Santiago on Weds. It was actually a freak event caused by huge forest fires that made that day exceptionally smoggy. Apparently the fires caused $100m of damage and resulted in the worst air in Santiago for 15 years. There were even official health warnings for people not to go outside. Read this article for the details.
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