There is only one more sleep left of family, festive fun and everyone wants to make the most of it.

The pickup trucks leave Caletta Horcon at 11am and we have a clear simple rendezvous point.

Fantasi Landia, Parque o Higgins, Santiago.

It was clear from our unsuccessful visit that this place would be good fun and when we all met up at the front gate there was a nice level of excitement in the air.

We were greeted on arrival with the sight of the Tsunami ride.

Axel measuring in at a few centimeters short of the required height, could have been an issue, however he rose to the challenge of walking on his tiptoes and we were off.

The ride is basically a big boat that climbs up a ramp, then flys down a very steep slope (proper shite yourself drop) and causes a considerable 'tsunmai' splash at the bottom. 

There is a viewing bridge over the landing pool where, if you wish, you can stand and receive the mother of all soaking.  Unfortunately for me this is where Axel wanted to be to watch his mother go on the ride.  It is basically like someone has thrown a big bucket of water in your face.

Certainly a good way, if slightly uncomfortable, to cool down when the temperature is well north of 30c.

The rest of the park is very much as you would expect. Runaway trains, shite food etc and it was a bit of a wrench when we had to leave and go and check into our accommodation. 

In reality we needed at least another couple of hours to see everything.  So as both an act of child meltdown prevention and a genuine desire to spend more time here, we promised Axel and Edith that we would return another day.

So we checked into our AirBnB apartment and settled in for a final night together.  By this point we had a successful routine of simply having dinner and sitting around drinking beer and wine so nothing needed to change on our final night.

The following  morning there was the small matter of me returning our hire car. This activity invoked mixed emotions, sadness that we would be without a car and reliant on public transport and also a bit of blessing. 

The reason it is a bit of a blessing is simple, the car is huge, by huge I mean both very wide and very long. It is a total nightmare to park and a previous parking nightmare is potentially about to come to a head.

A wee while back I made a small but significant gouge in the rear wheel arch.  This forementioned gouge in our brand new hire car had evolved over time and the lack of paint had created the perfect environment for a small amount of rust to develop.

Googling 'I scratched my hire car' gives a mixed result of horror stories, huge bills etc and simple advice such as 'just return the car, make sure it's manky, they might not notice'.

So here I was setting off in my super manky car to drop it off.  Although not far away from an 'as the crow flys' perspective, this is central Santiago traffic I am dealing so it is a half hour drive.

They either never noticed it, or didn't care.  So following a quick shake of the hand and a thank you for the business, I was out of there and heading off to the nearest tube station to meet back up with the gang.

Their flight home wasn't until 6pm so we still had a few hours left so headed out to see a bit more of Santiago.  A couple of hours perusing the shops and cafes of the Barrio Italia was a perfect finish and my nieces seemed to really enjoy getting a shopping fix.

So come three of clock it was time for them to go.  Everything was well organised, bags packed etc well in advance. All they had to do was drive their hire car (the same as ours) to the airport and drop it off, then catch their very long flight home.

Slight problem, where's the wing mirrors?

It would appear someone has taken a fancy to the wing mirrors.  Not the whole thing, just the mirrors themselves.

It is not that uncommon, back home, to see a wing mirror that some drunken arsehole has taken a boot to. This wasn't like that. They had been carefully removed.

There wasn't really much they could do. So their slightly stressful drive was going to be that wee bit more stressful.

I really felt for them when they headed off.

Turns out the car hire place, either didn't notice or care about the mirrors and within a couple of blocks of the apartment, there were even a few mirror salesmen who had the exact same mirrors for sale and were selling them in the middle of a dual carriageway.  What a coincidence.

We had the apartment booked for another 2 nights so the following day we headed off for our return to the fun fair.

The Tsunami was a bit of a hot topic in the house, with Axel alone managing to rack several hours of questions and discussion on it.  So there was only one place we could head to first.

As I mentioned before, Axel was a few centimeters short of the required height.  Edith on the other hand was a further few centimeters short.  She really wanted to go on.

We hatched a plan that would utilise tiptoes, this wasn't enough though.  We needed something else. 

Turns out a well positioned baseball cap is just the ticket.  We positioned it so it was perched on the top of her head, not too dissimilar to the style of East 17 and we nailed it, we all got on.  She loved it and the shell-shocked look on her face at the end was priceless.

It was a great day had by all and we are really glad we went back.

Our time in Chile was now coming to an end. 

We were going to be getting a bus that follows a route over the Andes and onto Mendoza.

To give us a little more time and to make things easier, we decided to spend an additional night in Santiago. 

Our bus was due to leave at 10am and the thought of checking out the apartment first thing and traveling across the city seemed too stressful, so we booked one night in a hotel opposite Estación Central.

Bus stations can be quite intimidating places over here, busy, crowded, hot, noisy and this place is right up there.

It is quite unique in that  there is a flee market attached and the whole place seems to ooze dodgyness.

So when we head out for a bit of dinner later both Jessica and I are in agreement that we are going to the first place we see.

So Maccy D's it was.  As shite as McDonalds is, it does have its plus points.

It is fast, cheap, they take credit cards and you gets fries with your burger.  The kids are also big fans of the plastic toys that accompany a Cajita Feliz. 

I would be lying if I said this was our first trip to McDonalds and I am sure it won't be our last.

On the walk back to the hotel with our food we got a further eye opener of the area. 

There is an apparent level of poverty and social deprivation that we hadn't seen since Buenos Aires.  A lot of drunks sitting around and an extremely skanky looking brothel.

The brothel got me thinking a bit.

Who would want to go in a place that looked as bad as that?

Then I thought, but sometimes the skankiest venues are the best.  The Barrowlands in Glasgow is in a horrible area and is a complete shithole, however it is arguably the best live music venue in Scotland.

Perhaps, I was being judgemental, don't judge  a book by its cover and all that.

This is all a bit weird though, who in their right mind would want to have sex in the Barrowlands.  That's disgusting.

Probably best to put this whole train of thought to bed.

I feel sick.

Come first thing in the morning, all is good. 

The decision to stay opposite the bus station  has paid off and with relative ease we catch our 10am bus.

Argentina here we come (again).

Lorne