I slept beautifully, but was awakened a bit earlier than planned (at 8) by Señora Myriam with breakfast. I had té con leche, a roll with ham, cookies and pineapple yoghurt. Afterwards, I had a lovely hot shower. It looks like it's going to be a chilly day though. What little Carribean tan I have can start to fade.

I walked to the first Ascensor, near the clock tower Reloj Turri. These ascensores are really not much more than wooden boxes on a rail, and when one comes down, the other goes up. There are loads of signs saying not to smoke... I wonder why!

For some reason it costs less to go down than to go up. Not sure what the logic is behind that. Anyway, I ended up in Cerro Concepcion, which is a great area with quaint houses painted in bright colours and lots of very steep streets. I walked over to Cerro Alegre, where there is a great viewpoint from which you can see the harbour. I took Ascensor El Peral down to the Plaza Sotomayor, where there are lots of men in uniform, as it's very close to the harbour and all the maritime buildings are there.

Further up, there is the Mercado Central, which is a bit dingy, and the Iglesia Matriz, which is in a very scruffy part of town, lots of beggars and bums around. I went into the church, which has all these statues of saints.

Every statue stood on a wooden pillar, which had plastic cards screwed to them with notes from people giving thanks for prayers that had been answered. Of course, Jesus was one of the most popular, but also San Judas Tadeo, which I found a bit unfair to the other saints. But perhaps he grants more wishes than the others.

I took the Ascensor Artilleria, which brings you up to the maritime museum, but I didn't go in, I just had a look at the view. Valparaiso is definitely a bit scruffy, especially towards the Plaza Sotomayor, but it's still cute.

There are also a large amount of dogs around, but other than their Cuban counterparts, these are not the rat-mongrel type variety, but huge Alsatians and sheperd dogs. They are also a lot better fed then in Cuba, which is probably just as well.

I had lunch at Vitamin Service, a cafeteria where they have wonderful sandwiches. Again, this was a Lonely Planet recommendation and again it was accurate. Since when do guidebooks actually get it right? I also had té con leche, which is about half leche and not much té, but I quite like it. They also seem to have great fruit juices which I may have to try later.

I went back to the hostal to have a nap, because I had been walking for over 4 hours. After that, I went the other way, to the Ascensor Polanco. This one is quite special, to get to it you walk through a badly lit tunnel carved out of the hill, and the ascensor is basically a lift inside the hill. You can see the stone as you zoom up towards the top. The top is a hutlike structure, high above the ground, with wooden floors and a rickety pathway to the hill. The area there is not very nice, and I didn't really walk around much, but the views are spectacular.

After that, I decided I had my fill of ascensores and hills for today... I sat at Plaza O'Higgins for a while, watching the chilenos walk by. I don't want to offend anyone, but I do think they are not a very pretty people.

To explain: Belgium is about intermediate (as we usually are). So say in Belgium, between the age of 18 and 35, one in 30 people can be considered attractive. The UK, I think, scores slightly better with one in 25 (well, I would say that with my boyfriend being English). Italy might score one in 20.

Chile, in my opinion, scores about one in 50. All the people here look pretty much the same and if you are unlucky enough to be a Chilean who likes blondes, you'd better hope for a boy- or girlfriend who is willing to dye their hair for the rest of their lives. Cuba, on the other hand, scores one in 5. Perhaps it's the mulato factor: the more intermingling of race, the prettier the people. If that is not an advertisement for racial integration I don't know what is!

Just one more note on trivia: there seem to be an awful lot of Salvatore Adamo cd's for sale here.