I may as well say at this point that the rooms are in some buildings around a swimming pool, which I doubt is in regular use, although who knows. Maybe in high season. All very elegant I'm sure. I could pay half the money and do without a pool I wouldn't dare to ask about using even if I could swim, though.
Fri 1pm. Got up stupidly late again. No big deal. I am having breakfast/lunch at the restuarant I went to last night. I think most of the tour offices will be shut for lunch til 3pm anyway. I will wander up that way after I've eaten and if they are I hope I will be able to fill in time at an internet cafe booking accommodation in Santiago/Buenos Aires.
I may try the second half of that walk I stumbled on yesterday afterwards, time and weather permitting, although glacing at a map in one of my guide books earlier I suspect it's further than you'd think. On the other hand, the board advertising the walk said 2.5h, not particularly difficult. Time permitting we shall see.
I vaguely plan to be demanding with the tour company and see what they can sort me out with to make the use of the three full days I have left after today. I suspect this won't happen though.
Feeling much better today.
Fri 2:20pm. Went into Kia-Koe tours, partly because they were open and partly because the shoestring guide recommends them. Have paid CLP50,000 for a half day tour this afternoon, full day tomorrow and half day Sunday morning. I opted out of paying USD18 (I wish people would stop quoting me prices in dollars, I am not American, I don't have a good feel for dollar value, I don't have any dollars but I do have, shock horror, the LOCAL CURRENCY) for a box lunch on the full day tour as my Bradt guide says it's a rip off. I will have to buy something tonight.
The woman in there seemed slightly unhelpful but maybe I imagined it. She kept not understanding my English intermittently and I resorted to very bad Spanish. It was all just a bit awkward. (I started in Spanish but she obviously noticed I was not a native speaker and switched to English.)
Had to come and buy a diet coke I don't want (2200 with tip, fucking hell, that's nearly THREE QUID for a can of coke) just so I can use a bog. I should have gone at the restaurant but I couldn't find it and the probably-staff glared at me so much I didn't like to ask. Fuckers. I would have asked but it's practically impossible to tell who's staff and who isn't in these places.
Tour this afternoon is at 3pm. I am being picked up at the hotel at 9:40am tomorrow and Sunday but today I said I'd rather go to their office as it wasn't worth the hassle of going back to the hotel.
I worry a bit I have over-booked myself but fuck it, at least this way I don't waste this afternoon and I am free Sunday afternoon and Monday to do 'something else'. I had to do the tours I guess really and while I could have shopped round how would I really be able to judge good v bad? At least this company has been recommended in one of my guide books.
Fri 8pm. Tour finished about six, bought some very basic snacks (biscuits and a couple of apples, and two bottles of water) from a frankly depressing and desolate supermarket and lugged them back to the hotel. Was going to book accommodation while in town but since two internet cafes I could see were both full and I hate waiting I figured I'd leave it.
Come into town for something to eat and a few beers. The receptionist said they shut at 10pm but offered to leave the key on the windowsill again, I asked if I could bring it out with me and I have, it seemed safer.
Was vaguely planning to try ceviche (not for the first time) but I can't find anywhere I can bring myself to order it. Some places just look too pretentious, I sat outside another place for a few minutes without attracting any attention. Back at the place I ate here my first morning (Tavake). They do ceviche here but it's more expensive than beef or chicken, which somehow seems off. Plus - despite what that woman I met in Santiago the other Saturday told me - I bet it comes with some sort of foul sauce or mayonnaise. I may ask the waiter, if he ever comes over. At least I have seen a waiter here.
I don't plan to be out super late and according to the price list outside the beer here is CLP1500 a can, so I may see how long I can stick on here after eating instead of going back to Marou (last night's bar). It was pricey there and not particularly and I don't want to go back too often.
I think the ceviche can fuck off. I just can't be bothered to look like an idiot asking and there will doubtless be some one ingredient whose name I don't recognise and therefore have to assume indicates something foul. I may compromise on fish with rice, depending on how the fish is cooked. I can handle asking that.
I should maybe ask about the ceviche but (maybe it's just in my head) there's something about this place (I mean the island, not this particular restaurant) that doesn't feel friendly. I think I'd ask in a 'normal' restaurant in a city, but at these kind of little places I don't get the right feeling. You might naively expect they'd be more helpful, but I get/imagine this 'fuck you, take it or leave it' sort of feeling. I suspect I am imagining this but who knows.
The tour was fairly good, if a bit short, and the guide fairly informative. We went to some place where the top part of the statues was quarried out, then to some place where there are 7 statues facing out to sea (which none of the others do apparently, I assume there is a way to tell which way a toppled statue was facing when they reconstruct stuff), then to some sort of cave, apparently the biggest on the island. There were a few too many cobwebs around in the cave for my taste, but it was OK in the end, I didn't see anything. I took photos of all the signs so in theory those would give the proper local and hence not very memorable names of the places I went.
Fri, 9pm. Not a bad meal anyway. Some sort of fish steak although I will not venture to try and identify it. Not an enormous portion but I was not particularly hungry.
No comments:
Post a Comment