I’ve been back in Chile for about a month post-vacation, so I thought it might be fun to do a photo log comparison of my life in Chile versus my life in the states, focusing on a couple of different categories. All of these photos except for a couple at the very end were taken in the past two months in one country or the other. Sure, it’s a bit of a cheat post since it’s mostly photos, but you gotta set yourself up for success and I’m still on track for the one-post-a-month goal that I set at the beginning of the year, so yeah. Still counts. [Andy Samberg reference anyone?] [Mom don’t look that up.]

Landscape

It’s hard to beat the beauty of the Yosemite mountains in California, but La Serena has some spectacular sunsets. I will always be a mountain girl at heart but I did grow up at the beach and appreciate a pretty ocean sunset as much as the next guy.

Climbing

The top two photos in this set were taken in the states in September while the bottom three are from Chile once I got back from vacation. I’m used to long multi-pitch adventure climbing in Yosemite, while Chile involves a lot of single-pitch sport climbing and scrambling around on beach rocks without shoes. I mostly suck at climbing right now since I took a bunch of time off during fútbol season (which is now over) but I’m slowly regaining strength and quickly realizing how far I have to go.

Camping

As much as I enjoy beach camping in Chile, I must say that the truck-top wedge tent with the memory foam mattress that we use on Yosemite trips is the more attractive option for these aging bones.

Family

This vacation was documented by a classic family portrait with my parents, attending a wedding with my partner, and a porch selfie with my best friend (or, second mom). Not pictured are all the other people I got to spend time with making homemade pasta, sending cracks, playing spikeball, drinking wine, and frantically searching for dresses to replace the one that didn’t quite make it to said wedding.

Meeting new friends as an adult is hard and doing it in a foreign language is harder but I am very grateful for the incredible group of amigas I’ve made over the course of the last two and a half years. I definitely would not have survived without my Chilean family.

In particular, I met my friend Coni in March of 2019 at the local bouldering gym and she was my gateway into the climbing and yoga communities as well as my crash course in Chilean slang and conjugating verbs in the past tense. Unfortunately we’re a bit too similar adventure-wise and she left just yesterday to go live and work in Vancouver, Canada for a year. I’m bummed she won’t be around, but obviously I’m already looking at plane tickets.

In other news, I’m finally going hiking in Patagonia next month, so I’m super stoked for that, partially because it means I’ll actually have some good material for this ol’ blog and partially because PATAGONIA! Wish me luck in the freezing cold.