Sunday, on our trip home from Santa Cruz, we visited the Reserva Nacional Rio de los Cipreses (the National Reserve of the Cypress River). Too bad it wasn’t a clear day as the views would have been remarkable. The landscape is very arid and we passed many cactus plants.

This park is known for its colony of wild parrots. We went to the lookout by the cliffs near the river where they dwell. We saw some of them flying…the bodies were greenish-yellow in color. Just as we were leaving the park, we saw a whole flock of them fly over us!

Also, we saw Condors!! They gave us quite the show! A couple of them flew so close to the car, it was amazing. It was exciting and another first for me!!

We took a hike on one of the trails that gave us a great view of the valley and also, by a waterfall.

Lunch was at a small restaurant, Restaurante Achicay, just outside of the park. Jacqueline and Ruben were the owners. I guess I was a challenge because I think I saw panic on her face when I said that I didn’t eat meat…or chicken…or pork!! I asked her if she had cheese and eggs and she said yes…great, I had a cheese omelet, which by the way, was delicious! The eggs were extremely fresh, I believe that she went out in the yard, where there were chickens roaming and got two eggs!

Finding our way back was interesting! Alan had a GPS and we had to pass through the town of Rancagua, which we did fairly well. It was finding an entrance to get onto the highway that was a challenge. The GPS actually got us on a overpass for the highway and said that we were where we wanted to be! The problem was, there was no entrance to the highway. After backtracking, we finally got where we needed to be. Fortunately, the traffic was minimal and we made it home in record time!

Another fun day….