Easter Weekend

At the beginning of this week I was feeling a little down. It's just hard to be away from family on holidays and I didn't think I would care so much this time because not everyone goes home on Easter, but for some reason I was really missing home. I think it was because it had just turned cold here so it actually felt like Thanksgiving or Christmas, not a springy Easter weekend so it actually made me miss all holidays in general!

Luckily, we had a great little Easter weekend planned so it made everything ok.
We had Good Friday off so Jess and I headed off to the beach for one last warm weekend before it really turns cold here.

We went (with half the city of Santiago) to Vina del Mar for a day by the beach on Friday and it was lovely. Sun, sand, good books and a pinic.

Later that night we headed over to Valparaiso, another little beach town in Chile. I had been there once before on my second weekend in Santiago, but only for a few hours and had been wanting to go back to explore more of the city. We got in a checked in to the cutest little B&B up on one of the hills. Valpo is made of a port and then 45 hills that basically come straight up from the sea. So we checked in and then went over to a great little restaurant with views over the port and amazing views of the gorgeous full moon.

Moonlight and twinkling lights over the city.... to bad I couldn't figure out the best setting on my camera.

The next day we were off to explore the ciy. Valpo is known for their artists and bohemian feel through out the town. So we wandered in some of the main hills looking at galleries and wandering around the winding, twisty roads.

One of the coolest things is the open air gallery along the streets where the best artists get to paint murals. I have to say we were looking forward to it so much, with huge murals, but I think we got turned around in the streets and only saw parts of it.

Colorful houses and tile benches lined the streets.



One of the murals with a tree growing out of the wall as well.

More bright houses

Painted stairs and walls

Saturday night, we headed back to Santiago for a little house warming party at a friends house.
Then, Sunday morning we woke up bright and early for sunrise service at the local English speaking church..... only to find out it was at a park 30 minutes away from the church that we showed up to at 8am. Oh well! We went back and slept and came back to church at 10:30.

After church, we tried our best to do a little brunch that of course turned in to a "Chilean" style brunch with french toast, mimosas, fruit and bacon. All in all, it was a pretty good day.

Allison and her amazing french toast.

Complete with easter confetti sent over from Jess' mom.

The best part...... at the end of the day I was running in the hills behind our apartment and all of the sudden it started raining!!! It has not rained in Santiago since I got here in September. ALMOST EIGHT MONTHS! I literally couldn't believe it. It only lasted for a few minutes and I'm pretty sure it was only in the hilltops, but it was so perfect! Washing the smog away and showing the beautiful snow covered mountains that you can never see.

Happy Easter to all! He is risen indeed.