12th March – Por favor. Si si. Gracias!

Back in Chile now. And in more sense than the country name it was stupidly chilly today. From the laxed Intercontinental at Mendoza to the bustling Intercontinental here in Santiago stood the herculean Andes, and once again we had to drive by ancient glaciers ever making their way to the bottom. The last rest day of the rally was welcomed by all yesterday, everyone just chilly out. Well, almost everyone. Steve Hyde had to pull his engine apart and change head gasket. Mark and Chris in the Model A had planned to spend the afternoon changing tyres which were sent from Buenos Aires Ford Model A club which were never sent, so it looks like their tyres will be somewhere close to as bald as a badgers bum by the time we finish in Ushuaia. I am well rested, which is highly important of course!!

Another swift border crossing at 3 kilometers above sea level. Either side of the few buildings huddles together is essentially 50k’s of road winding along a contour of a valley or just switchback after switchback and then a few rolling and twisting hills. We even drove past the smallest ski fields I have ever seen in my life. One or two T-Bar rope pulls going what seems to be up vertical cliffs with a hotel plonked at the base with at most 25 rooms! So peculiar. On the way up to the border we had to stop twice because it was just getting so cold!! Small puddles of water were frozen over and on the way down we had to do the exact opposite.

We have driven through very little villages or small towns over the past few days, only large city to large city and especially in Argentina there is nothing apart from grazing cattle when out of urban regions. Chile seems to be much more agricultural with bulk tobacco and other fruity tree things that I cannot name but i’m sure Dad ‘farmer’ Stephenson will be more than happy to give you a detailed lesson on all kinds of flora.

In other news, Dad’s hat flew off his head today while in the car. Lucky I’m nice and went back to get it for him. I’ll put that one on the list 🙂

My new favorite food is Empanadas! omg they are amazing. Pretty much just a meat pasty. I hope they take the world by storm just the same way Sushi has. Meat and veggie filled pastries are gods gift to my taste buds.

The Spanish don’t do dinner untill way late in the evening so I’m thinking I will squeeze in a power nap before hand. Don’t tell Dad because he will

say that I am getting old like the rest of them : Maybe I wont nap. Maybe I’ll power through just on principal.

More updates tomorrow 😀

Adios