A big serving of Humboldt Pie-Part 2 of 3

Saturday morning came and I was up like a kid on Christmas morning - raring to go to the beach!  We got ourselves ready after heading downstairs for our breakfast, which was included in our hotel fare, and slathered ourselves with sunscreen expecting what were hoping was going to be a massively sunny day.  And when we were finally ready to go, around 10 or 11am to head to Reñaca beach, one of the most popular and beautiful beaches of the area, we stepped outside our hotel and encountered... cold?  Wow, it was pretty chilly for a beach in the summer time.  Getting to Reñaca beach was going to be another challenge - our instructions were to take bus #601 to the beach, which entailed Kelli and me walking down the street in the hopes of finding a bus stop, which we eventually found, and at which bus #601 eventually did find.  So we hopped on, and instantaneously the bus lurched and sped its way down the coastline to Reñaca.  Now, Reñaca beach is separated from Viña del Mar by a stretch of rocky coastline that juts out into the sea.  And watching the scenery go by as we passed Viña, we looked ahead and noticed some eerie fog hanging around this coastline.  FOG?!  What the...  anyways, so our bus then plunged into the fog and sped through Reñaca beach - never even thinking about slowing down to let anybody off.  Before we knew it, were in Concón, a town north of Reñaca.  So now picture Kelli and Justin trudging down the coastline in full on summer swimming gear in dense fog, chilly air, and no beach in sight.  That's right, we had to walk all the way from Concón back to Reñaca.  We did pass some otherworldly scenery along the way, though.

Once we made it to Reñaca, there was still no sun in sight, and the air was still very cool, but we decided to stick it out anyways.  Kelli rented a chair and decided to plant herself down, determined to enjoy the beach, while I tried to run up and down the coast to warm up.

Occasionally the sun tried to flash us, but not very often and not for very long.  Two hours into it, we were frustrated and had had enough, so we decided to catch a bus back to Viña del Mar.  And after getting off at one end of Salinas beach and having to walk the entire length of the beach to get back to where we were on Friday, we were quite hungry and decided to look for food on Avenida San Martin, known for its good restaurants.  We eventually found one, called Delicias del Mar, and sat down.  Not fifteen minutes after we sat down did we look outside and see - the fog had completely lifted, and the sun was gleaming down from a clear blue sky!   Now where the heck was that earlier?!  In any case, this is where our day took a much needed turn for the better, as we were served awesome seafood - I had reineta (local fish) and Kelli had crab lasagna, and we both were in seafood heaven.  Not to mention that our meal was made all the more special by the repeating Foreigner song "I Wanna Know what Love Is (I want you to show me)" which I'm guessing must've been one of the cook's favorite songs.

So after one of the finest meals of seafood we'd ever had, we bounded back out to plant our spot on the beach, now that the weather was better.  We set up on Salinas beach near the pier, along with about a gazillion other people.  This was one of the most crowded beaches I have ever seen.  It made for great people-watching, though!

Me getting sprayed down with sunblock by the local sunblock tent

Just an idea about how massively crowded this beach was

Even dogs rent umbrellas

Now Kelli and I didn't do much wave jumping or ocean wading in general, for one very good reason - the Humboldt Current (ah, that's where the title comes from).  The Humboldt Current is a large current that carries water in the Pacific Ocean up from Antarctica and along the coast of Chile.  So that makes the water feel like Antarctica.  Take-your-breath-away cold.  We did brave it for a few short seconds, but only enough to get the experience of it.

Some people braved the frigid water, but didn't stay for very long!

After a good 4 or so hours soaking up the rays, we decided to pack up and head back to clean up before going out - our goal on Saturday night was to find a good sushi restaurant, as the sushi here is hands-down Awesome.  And here we encountered one of the more frustrating aspects of Viña del Mar - lack of taxis.  When we set out, it was dark and we didn't really feel like walking at night, but everyone we asked told us just to walk the 8 blocks or so to the restaurant.  But since we took a taxi last night, there's got to be some circulating right?  Wrong - there were zero empty taxis in the span of 45 minutes.  So we ended up walking, which turned out alright, but we did pass through some rather nerve-wracking areas.  But what we found at our destination, a restaurant called Shitake on Avenida San Martin, was some pretty fine sushi.  They like to wrap their sushi in avocado here, which I'm all for.  It was definitely worth it.

We did manage to get a taxi from the restaurant area back to the hotel, but not before passing this street performer, who seems to make a living acting like a wind up doll and kissing ladies' hands, all set to Andrea Bocceli.

Overall, it was a pretty good day!  The following day we had set aside to visit the sprawling, jumbled port city of Valparaíso, which is coming up on the next installment!