After our night in Viña del Mar we left the car in the Best Western car park while we caught the metro from just outside the hotel along the front into Valparaiso. Ticketting was a bit of a faff, having to buy one "stored value" card and put one-way rides for both of us on it, then both swipe through each gate.
We quite liked Valparaiso. The centre is a manageable size and quite busy, but felt welcoming as we wandered about.
In the space of 5 minutes and 200 yards we saw 6 different armoured bank trucks, which must be bringing cash to feed the end-of-month queues we'd seen at so many banks.
The most notable features of Valparaiso are the "Escaliers" - around 16 very steep funicular railways that climb from the flat area by the ocean up to the heights close behind.
They're not easy to find. I was expecting tracks visible out in the open, like Bournemouth. No. These have obviously been there a long time and have been built round.
We followed the signs for one, missed it, and then stood right beside the sign for the next, not believing it. We were directed through a door on the side of a multi-storey building some way from the cliff, leading to a deep corridor. I thought that only an elevator could lay behind, and that wasn't what we were looking for.
Ah! The corridor led to a funicular railway track all wrapped round with buildings, completely invisible from the street. There was a turnstile where someone collected 100 Pesos (14p) before you went up and after you came down.
We went up, took photos from the top, worked out that there was no other Escalier on the same hill and came back down the same way.
Whilst in Valparaiso I tried to buy the only two "tourist" T-shirts I saw (my preferred travel souvenir), however neither was anywhere near my size, despite one being marked as XL. Chileans didn't ALL seem that small (just most).
We returned to the hotel and left for Santiago. We'd used the iPhone Booking.Com app yet again to book ahead an apartment. When we arrived, the doorman denied all knowledge, and sent me to talk to the building manager. Only after several phone calls did the doorman fish out an envelope he'd had all along, clearly marked with my name and containing the apartment key.
The apartment was in the district of Providencia - full of restaurants and bars with tables outside under umbrellas. Those umbrellas have become our marker for a good place to loll. We liked Providencia.
We didn't warm to the centre of Santiago in anything like the same way. We didn't find an awful lot to see and by the time we were ready for lunch - seeking refuge from the sweltering streets - every cafe was jammed full of locals taking their lunches.
That wasn't the real spoiler, though. Whilst reading up on Wikitravel, I'd found out that the roads we came in on were subject to electronic tolls. Local cars are all fitted with an electronic tag, but visiting cars have to buy one-day passes within a few days - either on-line, at Servipag locations or at Copec petrol stations large enough to have a Pronto store.
I tried to pay on-line, but it was insisting on having a check-letter on the end of the registration number, which our Argentine car didn't have and which we didn't have (and neither did Alamo).
There aren't petrol stations in the pedestrian heart of cities, so we tried to find Servipag. Turns out to be another bank, complete with long lunchtime and month-end queues. Having no better idea, we queued and tried to pay. No way.
I just about managed to communicate with the Hispanophone teller, who read all our car import/export paperwork (who knows why, for a one-day pass) but we got stuck again on this bloody check-letter. The teller eventually sent us on a wild-goose-chase to the wrong location (not even address) for the offices of the people who run the motorways themselves. I think that was mainly because the queue behind us were growing progressively less happy about the stupid foreigners in the way of their lunchtime banking errand.
One of them did call after me ("Gringo!") with the wallet I'd left behind in my fluster, so they hadn't lost all sympathy.
Having had our town-centre visit so overshadowed by the hand of officialdom, we gave up trying to pay the tolls for the day and potentially forever. Providencia again provided a pleasant evening meal and drinks. Santiago centre 0, Providencia 2.
After we drove out of the city the following day, heading for the border, we spotted a service station in an island between the carriageways. It turned out to be a Copec with a Pronto store and the waitress/cashier there sorted the whole toll thing in just over 5 minutes. Damn.
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