Living in a cloud in the green hills of Chile

We have arrived at Fundo Los Lagartos, an organic farm-permaculture center 2 hours south of Santiago near Almhue, Chile. It is the most beatuiful place either of us has seen in a long time! The eco reserve is in the middle of a small valley among green mountains. It is wet, very lush, just wonderful. We are enjoying ourselves, there is slightly less work to do than the last farm, and we are eating fresh vegies from the garden frequently! Our hosts are two couples who are rastafarians and are very kind and welcoming. Beth has been working in the kitchen and in the greenhouses, Chris has been working on buliding a pipeline for irragation. We love it!

Fundo los Lagartos (named after the lizards)

Volunteer house with greenhouse to the right. We are camping near a river. The houses are very cozy, with an awesome metal wood burning stove that we use for all the cooking.

This is one of Paulo Nerudas many houses, this one is the most famous, located in Isla Negra. Police came here when he was dying of cancer and took him away after the Pinochet´s coup in 1973.

Chris enjoying the view. It was nice, a little anti climatic, but fun for sure. Its just a house now!

These are the elevators in Valparaiso that are now protected for thier cultural significance as a UNESCO world hertiage site. There are probably at least a dozen of them all over the city. Still working daily, they exist to get people up and down the hills to save time walking. They are entertaining to ride and discover what lies above, like musems, former jails, cemetaries, different neighborhoods. We used this one on Cerro Concepcion to get to our hotel, which was in an old mansion overlooking the sea. Were drinking lots of tea, eating seafood and bread.

Also, before arriving we had a five day break, where we stayed in a small beach town called Quintay (photos before this entry), as well as the city of Valparaiso (which means ¨go to paradise¨, yeah, its that pretty!).