Why Chile?

Tap.. Tap.. Tap.. Is this thing on? It’s been a while. While Mark has put no pressure on me to blog this trip, after recently re-reading some entries from our 2016 blog, there were so many things that I forgot from our trip. I was so grateful to have the blog to jog my memory so I knew I had to participate again.

So here we go.

Since we started gently sharing the idea of this latest adventure with close friends and family we were often met with the same question. Why Chile? To be fair we had originally planned for the “next adventure” to be in 2021 and throughout Europe. Due to Covid restrictions being up in the air from country to country and not wanting to spend large chunks of our time abroad in quarantine, we decided we needed to re-evaluate.

We knew we needed a large country with different geographies to explore and also comfortable enough “city living” that the kids could school and work could be done dependably. So after a bit of research I picked……… Buenos Aires, Argentina. The only thing you can count on in adventure is change people.

I connected with Venture Patagonia as I knew we’d want to spend time exploring Patagonia and just assumed we’d do so on the Argentinian side. I and was very nicely asked why we were choosing Argentina? When I confessed it was mostly a whim, I was told that “Argentina is lovely to visit but not such a great place in which to live.” Done. Chile it was, mostly for Patagonia. Also done because for the first time I consulted a map…and actual distances to and from attractions. (Doing you proud Mom.)

After spending time researching Santiago, I felt it would be a good fit. It offered the city life for which we were looking for a home base, lots of hiking and adventure day trip options within a three hour radius. Skiing/hiking the Andes, white water rafting, camping, beaches, wine country and little towns to explore are all weekend trip options.

While I spent most of my time thinking about our lengthier excursions- the Atacama dessert, Antarctica, Patagonia and Easter Island, I knew that there would be plenty of culture and endless exploration within Santiago. So we booked the house!

Everyone is settling in. The house is comfortable. We are taking daily walking trips to parks within a few miles of our house. And while I’m still trying to figure out a proper coffee situation here, emotionally things are running very parallel to our 2016 adventure. Mark nudging us all forward, Jane being the ever positive spirit lifting us, Wilson being the bright light of seeing every new thing as fun, and me, I’m still trying to process my emotions about it all.