Pichilemu, Chile

For Woody's birthday (Jan 16) he wanted to be by the ocean and so after some research in the Lonely Planet book, we decided to head to Pichilemu, Chile aka the World Surf Capital of Chile for a couple of days to settle into life in South America.

Only a three hour buss ride from Santiago - only costing $10/person - Pichilemu is way more than the sleepy little town described in the Lonely Planet guide. The entire town was jumping with full-on summer excitement. In droves, Chileans (mostly working class) descend upon Pichilemu for what must be like their Ft. Lauderdale. The streets were filled with people hanging out at bars and restaurants. There is a big zip-line right on the beach and a carnival complete with big tent and trapeze artists just behind the beach sands. Men pushed carts of churros up and down the beach while swarms of people frolicked in the water. They even have this crazy boat ride where a bunch of people pile on a big pontoon and get dragged through the surf by a zodiac. The funny thing is that the water is COLD. We're talking Pacific Northwest Cold, like 60 degrees cold. Serious burrrrrr. But the sun was hot and folks were on vacation, so everyone made the most of it.

Being the sun-deprived Seattlites that we are, we just laid on the beach soaking up the rays, which led to some pealing skin, but that's a small price to pay for for some real Vitamin D in January.

For our surfing friends out there, I can tell you that that surf in Pichilemu is good. Very good. There are a couple of very nice breaks just to the south of town, both rights and lefts. Unfortunately, neither of us were able to enjoy it ourselves. After a lovely birthday dinner at a charming restaurant overlooking the ocean, Giovannina and I both got a case of food poisoning and spent an entire day in bed watching Pineapple Express on our netbook (side note: food poisoning is the only excuse ever to watch Pineapple Express) . So although our hosts, Jose and Keke were very kind to us -they even got me a bottle of white wine for my birthday, which we're drinking right now - after the sunburn and food poisoning we felt like we needed to move on.

So we only spent a few days at Pichi, but would recommend it heartily to anyone passing through during the summer. Giovannina said it reminded her of Chiavari in summer - a busy tourist town, but only for the local citizens.