Cascada de las Animas numero dos

We woke up this morning ready for our horseback riding in the mountains. It was Kyle's first experience! We met our guide at the restaurant at 9am and headed towards the stable. Once mounted on our horses, we were ready to make our way up the mountatins. It was a pretty steep climb up the mountains but the view was unbelievable! It took us about an hr and a half to two hours to get up the mountatin - stopping along the way to take pictures and let the horses drink some water. As well as stopping and seeing the farm/gardens that are along the top. The amount of land filled with almond trees, oranges, avocadoes, goats, pigs, chicken, etc is indescribable. Once we got the top, the view was unreal. No words can describe how beautiful it was (thanks to Laura Johnson for the recommendation!). We spent some time just taking in the amazing scenery and talking about all of the different things that our guide has experienced in these mountains. His family has lived in this specific valley for many generations so it was very interesting to hear how the valleys have evolved and the water from the tops of the mountains have been channeled to the bottoms. Once our time was up, we mounted our horses to head back down the mountain - I may or may not have had a little freak out moment. I, of course, got stuck with the crazy horse who either stopped to eat everything or stripped over itself every .2 seconds. The climb down was extremely steep and complicated because it was just all loose rocks. I kept looking back at Kyle with complete terror on my face because I can feel my horse stumbling and can hear the rocks sliding and Kyle's horse skidding behind me. Kyle enjoyed the scenery but I just held on for dear life. Once on flat land, I enjoyed myself again :) Note to self - make sure you don't have a crazy horse or one with weak legs when going down a mountain! All in all though an unbelievable experience! Part of our Cascada de las Animas package was a trip to Concha y Toro - one of the largest vineyards in Chile. Our tour guide was amazing - Kyle loved him because of his corny jokes (Dad, you would have loved him too). He gave us a lot of insight in the family and the markets in which Concha y Toro has become prevelant. The actual vineyard and production side itself is HUGE! Pretty overwhelming actually. Since it has become pretty commercialized, we were only able to try 2 of their wines - both of which are available in the US. They were good, but Kyle and I have had them before since Brint (his old roommate) lived in Chile always had them around the house. So Concha y Toro is a cool experience but not a very intimate one if you ever make your way to Chile. Once we finished the tour, we made our way to the Sheraton in Santiago. Absolutely love Santiago! A very beautiful city with so much to see! You will be able to read all about that in our next posts.

Please see all of our pictures from Cascada de las Animas and Concha y Toro below!
https://picasaweb.google.com/Kyle.Joseph.Simmons/CascadaDeLasAnimas?authuser=0&feat=directlink