Emergency trip to Santiago

The only way we could sort out the van's paperwork without it taking weeks was to go back to the office in Santiago where the transfer was done!!!!  So frustrating but we were fortunate that Hugo, the buyer, was understanding and was happy for us to leave the van outside his house.  He even dropped us off at the airport.  The cheapest flight we could get was later that Friday evening (and even then it was £200pp for the 2 hour flight) so we set up camp at the airport café and did some organising.  

In Santiago, we could stay at Javier's apartment again, although this time with the whole place to ourselves as he has moved elsewhere and is renting the flat out in its entirety on airbnb.  We actually went over to his and Jason's new place the night we got back, for a mini reunion with them, Eddie and Ravi.  This homecoming of sorts was very comforting after all the stress of the last couple of weeks.  Seeing their reactions to some of our stories and photos made me forget the stress for a bit and appreciate the adventure we've had.

The offices we needed to go to were closed at the weekend so we tried to relax by doing some sightseeing that we didn't manage last time (Santa Lucia Hill) and going for dim sum on Sunday!

There were 10 of us altogether so we ordered loads of different things and it was little more than £10pp.  I was very happy this day.

On Monday, Paul and I got up early and headed to the Registro Civil.  After an hour in the queue, they said we needed to go to the notary to have Paul's address on the original contract changed to a Chilean one.  Salvatore, the previous owner, had very kindly agreed to meet us at the notary in case we needed him - he helped us understand what the notary was saying but in the end wasn't actually needed to sign anything.  The notary added an addendum to the bottom of each copy of the contract and then told us to come back at 5pm - they'd do all the shuttling to and from the Registro Civil for us.

I had terrible nerves for the rest of the day, worrying about them not being able to give us the documents we needed to sell the van the next day.  We had spent a small fortune coming back from Antofagasta and changing our flights out of Chile, and couldn't really afford to extend our stay any longer.  We went back early at 4pm, much to the amusement of the notary.  They did manage to get the document we needed confirming the transfer, but the Registro Civil had missed Paul's surname off it!!!!!  Wah!!!!  

There was nothing that could be done about it that afternoon though and the notary insisted it wouldn't matter.  But the actual transfer would take about 3 weeks to process so we paid for a notarised document giving Hugo the right to transfer the van to his name in Paul's absence.

Armed with this new paperwork, Paul flew back to Antofagasta on his own in the early hours of Tuesday to see if the sale could be completed.