Colliguay

Colliguay is this tiny mountain village inland from Valpo, small enough to not be on my Lonely Planet map. Dani and I joined some of her friends today (Sat 29th) on a drive to from a town just outside of Viña to the valley of Colliguay, about a two hour journey. We all piled into one of those little sort of mini bus looking things, which yes did have seat belts, but not much space. I have been looking forward to my first edge of a cliff drive for a long time, the kind where you have to drive about 5 mph or you will go over the edge. I am kidding, it was not quite that bad. There were some guardrails and high banks, but still there was an abundance of signs that said things like "USE EXTREME CAUTION" and "extremely steep slopes" and ones that showed pictures of cars being crushed by falling rocks (my personal fav). What a shame I destroyed my camera, that should be documented somewhere.

After two hours of dirt road hairpin-turn stick shift driving while sitting in the back seat, I was completely crippled by stomach upset, so when we arrived I curled up in a ball and missed much of the scenery before the early nightfall. This area looks like the mountains of southern California, with a lot of scrub and cactus, and is ridiculously pretty.

Soon after we pulled out of a park type area, we literally ran into cows, as they were being herded on the road towards our vehicle. It was like in the Lion King, during the stampede. Their eyes were creepily lit up from the headlights... maybe they were zombie cows.

After an equally thrilling/terrifying rest of the return trip, I got to play with the kids at a friend's house (Lunar lava!!... we made our own martians). I like hearing children talk, because there simple sentences are easy to understand. Plus, they are adorable when I don't know how to say something in Spanish, because they have no idea how to react, and just smile and stare at you and for some reason sing a lot. Yes, I am anxious to start volunteering in a school, I can't wait.