South America: West Coast

Chile is my 59th country (according to the list of countries I'm going by). Apparently there are different opinions on what qualifies as being a country. I haven't quite figured it all out yet but some of the things I look for are: Do they have their own currency? Do they have their own government? What language do they speak. I'm suspicious of countries in South America that speak Dutch. And sometimes even if they do fit the bill they aren't countries. But anyway, 59 (give or take a few) countries so far!

We are sailing very close to the coast of Chile as we go along. I can see the mountains pretty much all the time out my porthole which is really nice. I was surprised by the fact that a giant desert runs along the coast of almost all of Peru and Chile. There is nothing there! The last few ports have pretty much been piles of sand and dirt. Luckily, as we move south the scenery is starting to change. Also, it's summer down here in the Southern Hemisphere so the sun doesn't set until almost 9pm! It's a very strange feeling to eat dinner in the light in January. However, just because it's summer doesn't mean it's hot. At night it has been getting to be around 50 degrees and from what I hear I am in for some freezing cold weather. As we make our way south we will eventually sail through the Chilean Fjords. I'm so looking forward to this.