Cajon del Maipo

Francisco, Megan, and Danilo enjoying the snow

My little snow frolicker

The road we took looked JUST like the one in The Holiday
that Amanda runs down after she realizes she's
in love with him. How romantic.Our own winter wonderland in Chile

Beauty in motion.
Cheers to a great lunch with great friends.

This restaurant was in such a beautiful location
so I got artsy with the photos.

I like how they turned out.

Then it was on to the casino...

Of course, it was fancy smancy.
Check out those blown-glass chandeliers!

Meg making the big bucks. I can appreciate Danilo's
classic pensive expression in this photo.

This past weekend Megan and I went to Cajon del Maipo with our new friend Francisco and his work friend Danilo. Francisco has known Maggie for the past 8 years! He is a 26 year old guy who works way too hard but he says it is so that he can enjoy a more relaxed future once he has a family. His work days are filled with solving problems with the Chinese because he works for a telecommunication company that does most of its business with China. For this, he is always being sent to dinners with prospective clients--which means a lot of boring, repetitive conversations in which he has to act extremely interested. I think it is for this that he thinks I am super cool. Haha He says that he’s never laughed so much than when he hangs out with me and that is very flattering for me. So we all planned a trip to Cajon del Maipo which is about 2 hours from Santiago in the beautiful cordilleras de los Andes. It was raining heavily as we all piled into Francisco’s top-of-the-line Jeep which we all refer to as the “eep” because he got his J stolen about two weeks ago and was so traumatized that he went the NEXT day to get it fixed. The funny/sad thing is that he had to get all the letters replaced if he wanted just the J and it cost like $50 bucks all said and done. Dad, you will appreciate my honesty here because honestly…I would have just lived with the “eep” status. We drove up into the mountains and amidst the breath-taking view, the rain had turned to snow which began to cover the mountainside, the road, and ourselves when we got out to admire the view during of drive. After trying out the four-wheel drive in the mountains, Francisco and Danilo invited us to Calypso, an Italian family restaurant nestled into the valley of Cajon del Maipo with mountains all around. Pisco sours, pasta plates, and preserved wine made it so we were all quite relaxed when we got in the car and set off for the 1.5 hour drive to the casino. At the casino, we gambled por un rato (for a while) and then settled ourselves down in a classy bar for some hor’deurves (help me with the spelling Lee Lee! I’m still working on Spanish haha) We played some games, ate nice cheeses, and drank coffee, tea, beer, what have you. Did I mention that this entire day we spoke in Spanish? Ooooh ya. That’s right! Haha We finally returned back to Santiago late at night, and Megan and I succeeded in watching Slumdog Millionaire in its entirety. At the end of the night when it was time to go to bed, Megan said to me: “Today was a great day Rosey. These are the kind of days that make you thankful for all of your blessings.” I like that.