Visitors: the Prequel

Yes, we did have visitors before the boys. JuliaAnne and Saundra were here for a whirlwind few days (Saundra) and slightly more than a week (Ju). It was wonderful! First, just seeing Julianne so healthy and fit and energetic after last years' scare was such a relief. It bathed the entire time for me in joy and gratitude. We took long walks, she took long runs, we visited everyone we know here, they saw our teaching and missionarying and we were able to take some interesting side trips as well.

 We started off by overwhelming them with a supersized completo from La Plancha--at least a foot long hot dog smeared with avocado and tomatoes. Then we overwhelmed them with seeing nearly seven million trees at different stages of growth. Predictably, Saundra contributed to the planting effort. Seven trees closer to seven million!

We ate pastel de choclo and empanadas in Pomaire, tried to get up to the Andes, succeeded in finding the ocean--they jumped right in!--and ate at a Chilean food all you can eat cafeteria before sending Saundra off at the airport.  We stayed up late enough and slept in long enough that I don't think jet lag was a factor. At least, I hope not, because she was the featured speaker at a big event in Logan the day she got home. We love her so much for coming!!!

 We took off for Valparaiso and Viña del Mar after teaching one evening. Jay made reservations sight unseen and held his breath. When we had a hard time finding it in the narrow 45 degree steep streets, Julianne went into a little corner tienda to ask directions. The shopkeeper had NO IDEA, but eventually, after backing up a one-way street for two blocks to make way for a truck, we eventually found the Art Deco Hotel......two doors down from the shopkeeper who hadn't heard of the place.

 It was charming and comfortable and it was fun to observe Jay's relief in the morning at the continental breakfast when he saw regular tourists and not a bunch of drug-dealers and hookers. He kept saying, "This hotel has people from Europe! Nice people!" Valparaiso is old and fabulous and run-down and eclectic: wonderful contrasts. We found the cemetery where there's a memorial for Parley P. Pratt's infant son, Omner, who died when PPP was there attempting to spread the Gospel without a grasp of Spanish and without anything written in Spanish for the locals to read. He left vowing to rectify the later before another attempt. The baby, not being Catholic, was considered a "disident." It's actually a nice cemetery, and happily, was a short walk from our hotel. As was the Holy Ghost Lift that I wrote about in another blog. I so love those ancient mechanical elevators!

Viña del Mar, is upscale, modern and fabulous in a different way. It has a museum of historical artifacts--including one of the moai from Isla de Pascua (Easter Island), lots of beautiful beaches, hotels and restaurants. JuliaAnne had to take another dip in the ocean at Viña just because it was there.

It's hard to get a bad picture of a beautiful person, but we managed to with this eyes-closed shot of our Hoolie, but here she is at the Santiago Temple before flying home. Thank you, Paul, for giving us the gift of time with our little redhead.