Antarctica to Zimbabwe – Day 15 – San Jose de Maipo can be found here.
Our time at Cascada de las Animas has come to an end after five nights. It’s been one of those strange in-between trips, neither the restful relaxation of our first few days in Santiago nor the go-go-go of our time in Torres del Paine.
This time has served its purpose – we have succeeded in conquering the “pangal” horseback trek and enjoyed white water rafting and ziplining, while also getting caught up on homework, blogging, and the personal and household admin that’s a necessary evil during a trip this long. And I’ve learned that trying to add images to two blog posts a day while writing a third is a punishing schedule.
But we’re ready to move on.
Up at around 8:15 am this morning to pack up more of our gear, and then off to one final breakfast. The full spread of eggs, avocado, croissant, and fruit was on the table shortly after 9 am, and we were able to get back to our loft dome soon thereafter to brush teeth and finish up the very last of the packing.
And bid a final farewell to Restaurant Cat
Our Chile Concept rep and I both agreed that it would be difficult for our driver to come straight to our dome, so I instead sent a location pin for the main information centre via Google Maps. We ended up having the same driver that took us to Cascada in the first place, so he likely would have been able to find his way – but better safe than sorry.
I then proceeded to walk him through the resort’s winding roads until we reached our dome parking. He bravely positioned himself as close to the dome as possible, most likely due to persistent nightmares regarding our luggage.
It took a comedic level of effort but he got very close to the bags, so I suspect he’d say it was worth it.
We stopped at reception on the way out to settle our bill, only to be pleasantly surprised that there was no bill to settle – we had apparently missed one of our lunches, so they applied the unused credit to cover the cost of our laundry. A very welcome surprise, indeed! Especially considering that the amount of laundry we did would’ve likely cost more than our entire stay at Cascada, had we been foolish enough to have it done at our forthcoming hotel.
(We did have added charges for drinks / extra food throughout the trip, but they were settled as we went.)
We drove back into Santiago once more, watching as the scenery gave way to city:
The difference a quick drive can make…
After an hour and a half, our driver neatly disgorged us and our many bags at the doorstep of the Mandarin Oriental. A porter promptly set our luggage on the cart, and we joined the line to check in. This was still before 1 pm so we held out little hope of receiving either room – particularly after the British women ahead of us were denied an early check in.
Our turn came, and we stepped forth to meet our fate – and were promptly informed that not only had we gotten our connecting rooms, but they were already available. Doesn’t get much better than that!
Up to our very comfortable rooms:
I somehow forgot to take a picture of our bed, but just imagine a mirror-image of the kids room but with a king-sized bed. Interesting that their bathroom has a closing door but ours does not – which complicates the whole ‘connecting rooms’ equation! Not sure why kids get to lock themselves in the bathroom, but parents don’t have the same option.
We took in the pleasant view from the window:
And then headed down to the pool:
For lunch we split a pair of pepperoni pizzas:
The water was quite cool, but not as cold as at the Sheraton. We swam for a while, (carefully) playing with one of the water balls the kids brought – it skips across the water when wet. It’s a massive pool, so we had no issues giving the other guests plenty of space, though it was rare for more than three or four people to be swimming at once.
We eventually headed back to the rooms, and the kids tackled some more schoolwork while I went off to do a bit of shopping – my son had misplaced his sunglasses, while my gel deodorant had mysteriously transformed itself into at liquid at some point during the past four flights. Fortunately, the Parque Arauco – a shopping mall – was just around the corner:
While there were some Spanish shops, the overwhelming majority were English-language brands – which made it somewhat surreal to navigate while hearing Spanish all around me and utilizing the Spanish-language information stations. But I soon finished my shopping (again with the help of Google Translate).
The hotel’s in a nice area, so it was a pleasant walk:
We admired the hotel briefly – it has some beautiful spaces (and expensive shopping):
Off to dinner at the Mandarin’s Senso restaurant:
There’s also an exceptionally well-rated Japanese restaurant at the hotel – Matsuri – but the kids much prefer Italian.
Our daughter had the four-cheese pasta:
My wife had the pumpkin gnocchi:
And I had the king crab and abalone pasta:
For dessert my daughter had the chocolate torte:
My son had a dark chocolate mousse with cherry ice cream:
And my wife and I split the mille-fleur:
Early start tomorrow as we have a guided hike of the Aguas de Ramon park, and we want to get there before it gets too hot – so it’s time to head off to bed:
Continue reading Antarctica to Zimbabwe – Day 17 – Santiago.