Adios Sud America

This is the last blog to be posted from my new favorite continent. Yesterday, we completed the ultimate bussing marathon- fifty hours! We both still have very chubby ankles from that one. That bussing marathon followed our visit to Viña del Mar, a popular beach city in Chile, which was a bit overcrowded for our tastes, but had two unique highlights: a nude beach and the Super Completo, a customary Chilean treat that Sam had looked forward to, which is a hot dog with mayo, tomatoes, and guacamole. Our real grande finale place in Chile was Ancud, a small town at the edge of the large island of Chiloe. Ancud is a colorful, quaint, fishing town, where we had a beautiful camp site on a cliff overlooking the ocean, and made clams in wine sauce for lunch and dinner because it was so affordable and delicious. We spent a day going to visit a penguin colony, where we shared mate on the beach with a nice Argentinian traveler. Friendly people, beautiful scenery and sunshine! We are currently about to leave Nazca, Peru, which feels surprizingly comfortable after having been here three months ago. Funny to think back to how busy, confusing, foreign and desertous it seemed then, and now we see it as a lovely, fashionable little town perfect for travelers´ rest. I took a small plane tour to see the famous Nazca Lines, which was extremely interesting. There are a dozen or so figures that are very prominent (and enormous), including a monkey and hummingbird, which are not found near this area, but also numerable figures that are difficult to make out, and straight lines criss crossing and stretching out for miles. It is unknown why or how exactly these line came to be, and that mystery certainly adds to their astonishing appeal. Oh, dear! Time to get on the final South American bus. I don´t doubt that we will both return to this amazing place. That is all I can say to not get sentimental about closing this chapter of the adventure. On to New Zealand!