Chile over Christmas / New Year

[Anonymous]

4 of us [kids in elementary] are planning to visit Chile for 8-10 days over the winter break. For folks who may have done this before - suggestions for not to miss places, things to do? Your itineraries? Any tips welcome.

PS - this will be our first trip to the South American continent.

[Anonymous]

It's been many years since I've been to Chile, and it was over our summer (their winter) and without kids, but here are the things I remember doing:
-- skiing in the Andes (short day trip from Santiago)
-- the lake district, with the cute German houses and German pastries
-- the island of Chiloe, which is super duper tiny and looks like Ireland
-- took a plane ride up to the Atacama dessert, which looks like the moon. There is a flamingo preserve up there, but I don't remember it being very cool, because the flamingos were super far away. I think there was also someplace that we could go that had hot springs, and that was cool.
-- In Santiago itself, there is a really cool outdoor market where you can buy lots of stuff (googling suggests it might be the Feria de Santa Lucia). There is also a really cool indoor market (I think Mercado Central) which is a sight to see. I would take the kids to both -- even if they are not shoppers. They are just really cool.

It will be summer there, so you can do the beach thing. I think people like Vina del Mar? We went there, but it was winter and pouring rain so not quite the usual "Vina" experience.

You may want to investigate how bad the pollution is in Santiago during the summer. It was pretty bad when I was there in the winter, and my understanding is that summer is worse---but that was many years ago and I think they've put a lot of effort into cutting pollution, so it might be a lot better now.

[Anonymous]

Thank you!