This really isn't so bad...

So OK, I'm having it easy. I'm in the UK and I'm in London. But this is my first night properly away from home and it's all going swimmingly. Despite not working when I tried it hurriedly before going out, the free wi-fi at the hotel is working a treat now (first time, no idea what went wrong earlier). I'm pleased with myself in two different ways:
- geekily, I am transferring some music from my PC back in Skegness on to my MP3 player here thanks to the magic of the internet
- less geekily, I just e-mailed the ferry company to reserve a seat on the Puerto Williams-Punta Arenas ferry the week after the week they are carrying gas (i.e. for the trip of 13th February) and I e-mailed the decent-ish looking hotel in Puerto Williams to see if they have a room for the few days prior to that.

If the ferry and the hotel come through I still need to manage to get out to Puerto Williams, but I am hoping/assuming I can book a flight from Puerto Williams without too much difficulty - there's one a day, which isn't much but beats the ferry in terms of frequency. That just leaves the time between arriving in Santiago and flying from Punta Arenas to be dealt with.

The timing is a bit awkward as I will have about 8 days between arriving in Santiago and wanting to be in Punta Arenas. The raw journey time by bus is about 42 hours, so while it's almost certainly possible to bus it I doubt it would be much fun. I could fly down as I originally intended, but then I might spend too much time in Southern Chile by the time I've done the Puerto Williams trip and got the bus back up to Santiago via one or two other places.

I am going to see what happens with getting the Puerto Williams trip booked and then make the call, as that is one of the things I now want to do quite badly, even though I hadn't any plans to go there a month ago. I'm certainly keener to do that than the Tores del Paine-in-the-arse national park. (Sorry, had to make that joke sooner or later.)

I am thinking that maybe I could do the trip to Easter Island from Santiago before going down there, instead of doing it when I return to Santiago from Southern Chile. That would transfer some time from the later part of the trip to the earlier part, so to speak, and compensate for the fact that I'm doing the Puerto Williams trip a week later than I had originally planned.

Fingers crossed anyway. If everything goes as well as today, I'm laughing...

Oh, I might as well note that I asked another friend with vaguely relevant experience about 'valuables in the back with me' vs 'valuables in the boot with the big suitcase' in 'dangerous' places like Rio and Sao Paulo. She unhesitatingly said 'valuables in the back with me' (but as discretely as possible, of course). So if I remember correctly, that's 2-0 on friends' opinions for valuables in the back. Coincidentally, that is the plan I originally favoured, so I just hope my memory hasn't been selective. :-)