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Cajon del Maipo
Gorgeous sceneryI landed in Santiago on Sunday morning at the ungodly hour of 5.15 am and the first thing I noticed was that it is BLOODY COLD. Much colder than I was expecting. I don't know what I was complaining about in Bogota. I was told when I got here that electricity is super expensive and to be careful not to leave the heater on in my room. This explains why no-one seems to have cottoned on to indoor heating here and I am freezing wherever I go. It definitely has an influence on fashion, as people wear layers of blankets, ponchos, and scarves in order to stay warm.
However all that said I have been enjoying my time in Santiago so far. I arrived in the B&B,
Casa Moro and went straight to bed for a couple of hours, joining the other guests for breakfast at around 9.00ish and confusing them no end, as they couldn't quite work out where I'd come from. It's a lovely little guest house with only a few rooms, and as luck would have it one of the rooms occupied by a couple from Auckland, Robyn and Colin., who I ended up spending the next couple
of days with.
I was too tired to think on Sunday morning, but Walter, one of the owners and hosts of the B&B, had soon organised my day, and I set off with Robyn and Colin to an area called Cajón del Maipo, which is in the foothills of the Andes. Our destination was Cascade de las Animas, near the village of San Alfonso. It was a beautiful day, crisp, clear and very cold. It was quite an adventure just to get there, involving the Metro, and a colectivo taxi. Colectivos are a great concept - they are essentially shared taxis to a common destination, which makes them only a little more expensive than buses.
We arrived in the countryside to an outdoors centre, which included a restaurant and more kinds of outdoors activities than you can shake a stick at: white water rafting, trekking, horseback riding, camping...the list goes on. After a delicious and hearty lunch at the restaurant, Robyn, Colin and I set off for an afternoon trek to some waterfalls. Our trek in the Andes was gorgeous, and the scenery spectacular. After a couple of hours we certainly earned a wee tipple in the bar
afterwards! This perhaps was our undoing, as we then walked up to the side of the road to wait for a colectivo....and wait and wait and wait. I think we were all getting a little concerned after about 20 minutes when nothing turned up. But then a bus came round the corner heading towards the metro, so on we hopped. First person I saw was our guide for the afternoon, and the second and third were Sasha and Mike, also guests at Casa Moro. So then the five of us began the return journey to the hotel, which definitely seemed a lot longer than the morning's one. I slept very well that night!
Next day Robyn and Colin had organised a trip with Walter to a little fishing village nearby, and they kindly invited me to join them. It was a fantastic day. On the way we stopped in a cute little church, Santuario de la Vásquez, where supposedly the Virgin Mary had appeared in 1898. Nowadays there is a huge pilgrimage every year to the church to commemorate this sighting.
We arrived in Quintay, a tiny fishing village, which until 1967 was also home to one of
the largest whaling stations in the country. Nowadays it is a marine research centre and information centre about whaling days. We had a look around the whaling centre and then headed towards one of the few restaurants in Quintay, where we had a delicious entree of razor clams, and then shared a main meal of Conga Eel. Good thing we shared, as it was the hugest portion of fish I've ever come across. And absolutely delicious!
The next day Robyn and I headed off to Los Dominicos, a handicraft village on the outskirts of Santiago. We had a great day, browsing in the arts and crafts markets and picking up a few beautifully made local handcrafts, before heading to the downtown area to find some boots. Yes, it may be true that I bought boots in Buenos Aires but you can never have too many. Robyn and I had a wonderful day, but I'm not sure that Colin was quite as excited about it as we were!
Today was Museum day and city walking tour for me. I started in the Chilean Museum of Pre-Colombian Art, which also included a temporary exhibition of Inka things. After looking at
a lot of ceramics, it soon became apparent that I have reached my museum quota. There were a LOT of ceramic things - pots, statues, bowls. After a while they all looked the same. From there I headed to the Plaza de Armas, and had a quick peek in the Cathedral. I could well be over churches and cathedrals too. It was a very beautiful cathedral, however I thought the best part was the little confessional boxes up the side, complete with living and breathing priests waiting to hear confessions. Even I, a dedicated heathen, could see that it would be impolite to photograph them.
I then walked up to the Museo de Bellas Artes, really in search of the Museum of Contemporary Arts. I was very weary of museums by then and barely glanced at any of the undoubtedly beautiful old masters. The big disappointment of the day was discovering that the Museum of Contemporary Art had turned into a solitary room in the basement of the building, following earthquake damage to the building itself. The big surprise however is that is the only evidence of the earthquake damage that I have seen so far, given that Walter
and Marcelo said that they couldn't stand up during the earthquake.
I kept up my walking tour of the city and headed towards Barrio Lastaria, a small bohemian neighbourhood with eclectic designers and a few bars and restaurants. At lunch I was asked again if I was French, because apparently I speak Spanish with a French accent. This would be much less embarrassing if I actually spoke French.
Next up I headed towards the Museum of Visual Arts, which was one of the highlights of the day. My self-designed walking tour was not over yet however, and I headed over the Barrio Bellavista, basically the bar/restaurant/nightclub part of town. The reason for my visit however was to visit one of Pablo Nerudo's houses, La Chascona. This was the other highlight of the day. Modeled on a ship's design, it was quirky, artistic, imaginative, creative and very inviting. I loved it!
From there I trudged to the financial district, full of soulless high rises and wide avenues. It was an interesting contrast to the rest of the days' sights, but nothing of any interest, so then it was onto a Metro, homeward bound, and heading towards a well
deserved glass of red. Or two. Just to help me keep warm, I promise.
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anonymous
non-member comment
No need to worry about entertainment
in Santiago. Sounds brilliant! Can't believe that you are nearly home!