Finally I´ve come across some fellow travellers, however, most of them are at least middle aged. On the bus ride out to Valpraiso, I met a friendly semi-retired couple fom NZ, John and Pauline. It was very comforting to speak with someone in English again. They even offered me a lift to the airport the following day as we had the same flight to Lima. I declined as they were leaving almost 4 hours before the flight was due to leave and they were staying in a different hotel.
The bus was not without troubles - about halfway to our destination, I heard a loud bang even through my iPod. The bus started to wobble at 120 km/hr and we knew a tyre had blown. With smoke billowing from the left side, the driver did a great job of slowing the bus and kept control until we stopped on the side of the highway. This was another first in my life: I had never been in a vehicle that has blown a tyre. We later discovered that both tyres on the left of the bus had blown - again, brilliant job by the driver to stop the bus from 120 km/hr with no tyres on one side.
The beach itself was rather disappointing (and cold). A fog lingered over the town all day. Then it was time to grab some lunch at a prestigous restaurant, which is where I met a girl from Miami and got a bit of info on South Beach. Everyone slept on the return journey as it was a longer than expected day with the blown tyre, switching buses 3 times and heaps of walking.
At 5:40am the following morning, I was glad to leave Santiago. At the airport, I ran into John and Pauline. We met another middle aged couple who told us of their encounter with a thief. The lady had her necklace and glasses ripped from her neck while simply standing in the streets. There was no hope for reclaiming those items and they didn't even report the crime. I´ve also heard other stories of someone being asked to hand over their camera to crooks. When they refused, they were stabbed and spent a few months in hospital... cameraless. Looking back on my experience, I guess it worked out for the best. I´ve learnt that in South America, you cannot expose anything of value when you are by youself - safety in numbers. Therefore, I´m confident with my decision not to buy another digital camera until the States.
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