The Heights of Angol

Well well well, I have gotten a new perspective on my lovely little city here recently.  Literally--I went up to two very high points on different sides of town to enjoy the beautiful views. Last week Vlady drove Franco and Francisca and I up to a lookout point on one of the roads that leads west out of town, through the very high hills.  It was a gorgeous afternoon, without a cloud in the sky, so we could see pretty damn far east.  From up there you can see 5 (FIVE!) volcanoes along the horizon! It still amazes me every time how casual all the Chileans here are about their volcanoes--they could only tell me the name of one of them. Oh that thing? Just some volcano, nothing special.  On this last photo, I tried to point out some spots for ya- the other hill I pointed out is that one I climbed this past Saturday with Ainsley and Todd (photos to follow, just be patient). 

You really can see a lot from up there, all the way to some other towns.  Apparently at night it's even prettier.  Vlady told us a story about one of his cousins: his family lived in the country, and when he was little (5 or so), his dad was driving him into Angol for the first time, at night.  This little boy had lived his whole life in the countryside, and had no real concept of what a town would look like.  When they got to the top of this hill and could finally see the lights of Angol over the other side, the little boy got excited and told his dad that must be where the stars slept at night! That has to be one of the cutest stories I've heard; it's going in my sweet anecdote bank (sorry, friends and family, if you have to hear it again at some point in my life). 

Then this past Saturday, as I have mentioned, my friends and I set out to get to the top of another hill that I can always see on my walks home.  At the top is a little shrine to San Sebastián, so that was our reference point as we made our way up the grassy side of the hill. It actually did not take nearly as long as we expected! Once we were up there the wind was pretty strong (which I loved), but the warm sun was blazing so we just took it all in for a while.  Oh, forgot to mention the bonus of using the little wood-and-rope bridge to get there from the back of my neighborhood--that's always way more entertaining than it should be for a 22-year-old person.

not the hill we climbed, but a neighboring one that I plan on also climbing at some point

ahhh just take it in

Ainsley enjoying the breeze

Todd likes this hill

I should also pass along the information that there were three crosses up at the top of this hill, next to San Sebastián's little shrine, and I did get up onto the middle cross and pretend to be Jesus for a minute.  Maddie Boots, still blaspheming all the way down here in Chile.