Our first stop this morning is the wonderful Pre-Columbian Art Museum.

Mounted policeman, checking his iPhone.

Santiago, at least the parts of it that we wander, has beautiful views of the Andes, nice leafy "un-trafficked" streets, friendly people, and interesting shops and restaurants. If we look around and momentarily wonder which direction to go, people invariably come up and offer their help. Our first dinner here is conger eel!

We have made it to Santiago, Chile. About 14 hours of travel time so might be about time for a quick na zzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

So, we are.....

.....halfway there, at our two hour layover in Panama City.  I sincerely hope this will turn out to be the least interesting blog post of the next 4 weeks.

We fly to Santiago, Chile Wednesday morning the 16th, arriving after long flights, on the 17th. We will explore for a few days and then board the ship in Valparaiso Sunday. Stay tuned!

Antarctica, here we come!

We will spend Christmas and New Year's just about as far south as you can go, in the Earth's basement. Details to follow....

For any friends and family who may check in here, stay tuned for big news!

Apparently it's ok to just park overnight, right in the middle of an intersection.

A last dinner in Greece - from our table we gaze up at the Parthenon and indulge a wonderful plate of grilled prawns. It's up at dawn tomorrow for the long haul back home.

On the street, your late afternoon snack can be roasted chestnuts, grilled corn on the cob, or spit-roasted lamb. I went with gelato.

Ok, by the time anyone reads this, we are likely in the air, from Athens to Istanbul to L.A. My depression at leaving has now maxed out. But after I'm back for a few days I will try to post links to some short videos, if anyone is interested - there was no way I could upload them to the blog, wifi was always much too slow to allow that. So if interested, give me a couple of days to get back and get them available, just check back here for links.

I think the name of this shop is "Mountains of Crap".

Someday, somewhere, archaeologists are going to unearth a vast trove of several hundred thousand marble noses.

more museum stuff II.

more museum stuff.

The National Archaeological Museum just goes on forever with wonderful antiquities.