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Published: October 20th 2005
Since arriving in Chile we have done nothing but eat, drink wine and do extreme things, long may it continue….
Santiago turned out to be the nicest of the South American capitals that we have been to. Very reminiscent of Paris in architecture we felt quite at home especially since the Best Western Hotel has an INDIAN RESTAURANT! Of course, we over ordered and bravado got the better of us as we told the waiter that we wanted it HOT. Seems our taste buds have gone all woosie on us!
From Santiago we headed north to the port city of Valparaiso famed for its funicular railways running up the cliffs to the suburbs. Unfortunately our trip was blighted by lots of rain and it being a Sunday which means nothing is open. We stayed in a very quirky hostel, a clapboard family house from the turn of the century, called Villa Kunterbundt, where we had the turret room with a 360 view of the ocean. We narrowly avoided being evicted when the hostel owner invited us to “meet her little monsters” which Claire interpreted as the hideous doll collection in the hall and bathroom and actually turned out to
be a reference to her children! Mind you we did have a bath in a clawfoot bath, only our 4th or 5th bath in six months.
After a very pleasant gourmet trip up the coast to Con Con, proclaimed as the culinary capital of Chile where we ate fresh fish and queen scallops washed down with Sauvignon Blanc whilst looking out over the Pacific Ocean we decided to take a day bus into neighbouring Argentina.
The route to Mendoza in Argentina involves a spectacular journey over the Andes by bus, along precipitous mountain roads and a border crossing at the top of the snow-covered mountains where we all have to get out and wait in the freezing cold while the officials search the luggage, bus, and anything else they can get their hands on.
I am trying not to sound blasé about these journeys, having crossed made several now. Each one is a wonderful experience, and keeps you gazing out of the window in slack-jawed wonder - I will never tire of it. Arrival in Mendoza is an anticlimax having expected a little town and getting a bustling metropolis. We also have some trouble with hostals, the
Coming Soon
to an offlicence near you!booked one not meeting expectations by several miles, and knowing that the town is completely booked out for this weekend holiday. A friendly taxi driver who insists he comes from New York, but whose story does not quite hold sufficient water so to speak, helps out by driving us to several places while Claire goes to check them out. This is the way to get somewhere in bigger towns, which is much less preferable for me because it doesn’t involve the being installed in a bar bit, but sitting in the back of a cab. It works though and we end up in a pretty nice hotel in the centre of town (Hotel Carollo)
Continuing our penchance for extreme sports - we go out for the day on a combination trekking, abseiling and thermal bath experience. Alright so its not all extreme, but the abseiling was not far off, going first down a valley wall about 50ft high, then moving on to he main course of one 150ft high - this is about 15 stories, and feels like a long way down - hell it IS a long way down. Claire came through with trumps but I have a
Big Barrel
Thinking of ways to get this into the wine rack... rather amusing video of her making her way down, cursing me for bringing her on these trips and looking for all the world like a blue footed boobie again! Afterward we relaxed in a nice thermal baths for the afternoon, taking in the waters and bit more blue Andean sky.
We also did some more horse-riding, going on another two day ride with overnight in a lodge like the one on with Gavin in Ecuador. In fact it was pretty different, the lodge being a lot more civilised (no open air toilets!) but a lot colder - there being several feet of snow outside.
The horses were fun though, I got a right nag on the first day who didn’t want to more much, but a real goer the next day. We also met a lovely pair of Americans - Dana and Kevin who had managed to get their way onto tours around all the vineyards by agreeing to write an article for a local magazine. Great idea as you end up with loads of freebie bottles of wine from the producers. Luckily for us they had brought some of their spoils with them on the trek and
offered to share them with us to keep out the cold.
Mendoza is fab for food and drink. We went to several great restaurants and ate like kings for a week, having had little in the way of culinary experiences during our trip to date - and we do get a lot of pleasure from our food after all! Claire recommends Bar M in the Hyatt Plaza where we had a fab bottle of Santa Faustino Bonarda 2001. Note also, the interesting drinks available in another restaurant we went to!
Another fab restaurant called Francis Milman 1884 set in an old bodega building served up a rib dish which we noted on the menu but didn’t go for. However the diners next to us ordered it, and soon a dish turned up with just that; a rib. Only one. But it must have been two feet long and stretched from one side the table to the other bridging the couple quite nicely.
The two of them clearly weren’t expecting this, but tucked into this dinosaur rib with gusto from each end of the thing. We watched from the sidelines (only ´interested´ you understand - infact most the
restaurant gawped in wonder), hoping they would meet in the middle like in the scene from Lady and the Tramp where they are eating the same piece of spaghetti and meet in the middle! Lucky for us they have a restaurant in Punta Del Este Uruquay which is our destination for New Year.
When not eating in great restaurants or on horseback we took a tour and visited two wineries and an olive oil producer. Weinert who we know from old and Fabre Montemayor. Weinert was wonderful. Old school french style, oak barrels, vaulted cellars etc. Nice selection of wines too, just look at the size of that barrel! Fabre Montemayor was boutique, nice cabernet sauvingon but admit to shipping their inferior wines to England so give them a wide berth in Waitrose and go for that consignment of Weinert winging its way to you instead!
Back to Chile where Claire has been enjoying herself this week in the wine region. No grapes yet as the vines are just starting to come into leaf and there is still snow on the Andes as a backdrop.
Staying at the hotel tourismo in Curico - not a particularly natty
The big one
Abseil that is! name but someone has been though it with a designer eye and converted what must have been a miserable 70s style place into somewhere nice and comfortable. So comfortable in fact that we spend the days cruising around the numerous vineyards in the area and the evening huddled around their fire drinking the spoils of our trips. We had a private tasting at bodega Alta Cima where we tried their Chardonnay straight from the barrel and got to speak to their master winemaker.
The highlight was lunch at the Miguel Torres bodega. This consisted of 4 courses of fabulous food and a wine flight. We had such a good time there that we went back for lunch the next day too before catching a bus south to Talca.
A quick bus from Talca gets us to a German run hostal in the middle of nowhere. It turns out we are the only guests, this being the beginning of the season. There were however, plenty of staff… we counted at least 10 but new ones kept appearing each day. Most were young ladies from Germany/Switzerland who had come to help out for the season - obviously it gets a
Big relief
All smiles after the 45m abseil LOT busier…nice place though (Casa Chueca, Talca) and everyone made us feel very welcome.
Over a few beers the first night we get talked into going on a walk with a couple of the staff on their day off (mind you, most of my days off involved more work than their days on) but it’s an early start. Sure enough early next day Claire realises the error of her decision but I think sod it I need a walk and go, still asleep, to get the only bus to the park.
12 hours later I get back to the hostel absolutely knackered, having walked for seven hours and covered around 18 miles. But it was a fantastic walk, the snows having just melting, exposing parched dry wood and allowing new plant shoots to come poking through the thawing soils. Its spring here - I really like spring - people are happy, the animals are happy and even the plants seem happy. So as we move south down Chile we are following the snow melt and start of spring, so still cold - but with the promise of warmer days to come.
Talking of spring, there was a
Kevin and Dana
In the mountain hostel bloody great wisteria outside our bedroom. In full flower. There have been hundreds of wisteria over everybody’s house, garage, pergola etc throughout this area. I only mention this because our Royal Horticultural Society guaranteed wisteria growing happily at number 90 for six years, has never bloody flowered and shows absolutely no inclination to do so. Will someone show it this picture for us and shame it?
I get back from the walk to find Claire singing along to Queen in the hostels kitchen. It seems she has been adopted by the cook, Micky, for the afternoon and is contentedly preparing traditional Chilean cuisine for the returning hunter to enjoy. Although the hostel is 90% vegetarian, because the owner and wife have disappeared to Santiago for the day, they have decided that empanadas and cazuela stew, both with meat, are the order of the day. Ha.
You know from our previous blogs that we can get ourselves into trouble with our Spanish. Logging on last week Claire had emails waiting for her on one day in English, Spanish, Portuguese and Italian! Simon got an email response in French last week, assuming from his email that he was French and
Trusty steeds
Us looking at home in the Condor del Plata Argentina trying to be helpful by responding in French. We handle situations like this by using one of the marvellous internet translation sites. Often as not we get an amazing piece of text back which includes such gems as…
“We propose to you nuitéé with 16 usd per anybody. This includes/understands housing, small the dejeuner (super copious and with natural products), and the evening meal in family. Normalized always tries to diversify these meals as well as possible and to make you connaitres the local habits. This price gives an excellent report/ratio price quality, incomparable with D different establishment of Bariloche”
Or;
“Ihope zour Vulcantrip will well. We are make vulcantours too. We offer trekking tours, horsbackriding, Rafting, the lake is close from us or you can relaxing from the twon.“
God help us! But I have a feeling when they translate our Spanish efforts the same applies.
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HelsBels
non-member comment
Trumping or following through
You've brought a little wonder and a lot of jealousy to my dreary desk - but i'm intrigued by the comment 'Claire came through with trumps'. If the girl's a bit breezy, surely that's a private matter? Assuming it didn't cause other abseilers to faint and crash down the face! Big hugs to you, Hx