Poets, Funiculars, and Casinos - Of Course!

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After a weekend in Santiago and regaining a little bit of sleep, we decided it was time to head west to the popular destinations of Valparaiso and Vina del Mar. Only a quick hour bus ride from Santiago (about $7 US) this was an easy overnight trip.

Right next to each other on the coast, these two cities couldn't be any more different. Valparaiso is a harbor town, bustling with people, markets, and is also a designated UNESCO World Heritage Site. Vina del Mar, the beach town next door takes a completely different pace to life. Its clean streets and beautiful hotels and casinos along the beach make it one of the favorite places for local Santiago residents to forget about everything during the weekend.

We arrived on a slightly chilly day in Valparaiso, meaning I actually wished I had worn pants, and set off to find the good views of the city. It was a little cloudy and honestly this slightly ruined our mood and first impression of they city. None the less we trekked all the way across the coastline to arrive at the famous funicular that would take us up to the other levels of the city. I think some of the streets here put San Francisco to shame. We paid our 500 peso one way fare and made our way to the top of the hill. From here we had a wonderful view of the city and the harbor.

We decided that it was time to grab a bite to eat and attempted to start wandering around the top of the city until we realized we had no idea where we were and the Lonely Planet map cut off...so we did what any reasonable traveler would do, asked the pharmacist (as Megan says - Pharmacists are always educated and informed) and then proceeded to hop on the next short bus heading the right direction. The buses are quite an adventure, small and they move pretty quickly through the streets, but at only about 270 pesos a ride, its definitely the cheap way to go. We managed to make our way back to the city center and found a random place to eat some fish for lunch.

We had pretty much had enough by this point of Valparaiso, so we headed on over to Vina del Mar and were pleasantly surprised with the vast change in scenery. Our hostel, the little castle, was located up on the top of a small hill close to the city center. It was quite a hike up the windy streets, and we had a hard time finding our place considering there was no sign to even indicate this was a hostel or guest house. We rang a random bell and low and behold discovered we were in fact in the right place. The hostel was cute, a 2 floor place with large living room area to share, a cute kitchen for use and about 6 or so rooms. We dropped our stuff and most everyone took a nap while I took a call from the states.

That evening we took a stroll through the town and over along the beach. It was so nice to just walk around the city and enjoy all the views. There is a casino which got me pretty excited, but when I realized I had to pay an entry fee of $7, we backed out of our excursion. After a beautiful sunset over the crashing waves, we strolled along until we found a nice restaurant to enjoy that was recommended by the owner of our hostel. I had Pastel de Jaiba, which is like a baked cream crab dish, with fresh crab, really fabulous, and we also split some ceviche, etc. Of course we enjoyed a fabulous bottle of wine from the area and then Rita and Megan decided it was time to hit the sack. Molly and I weren't ready to give up on the night yet, so we wandered over to a bar by our hostel called Cafe Journal where we enjoyed a large bottle of beer whilst watching fabulous music videos from the 80's.

I didn't get much sleep because of the Argentinean boys across the hall who noisy arrived at 4 am in the morning and the creaky floors as everyone woke up early in the morning. But none-the-less, we got up and packed up to head back to Valparaiso. Museums are all closed on Monday in Vina del Mar, so we had to go Tuesday back to Pablo Neruda's house, a famous Chilean poet. He had a beautiful 5 story house overlooking the harbor and the sea. The views were really amazing and the history was pretty interesting as well.

So it was a successful couple of days out of Santiago, it was a busy week here trying to finish up everything before heading out next week. We did manage to attend a local festival which was pretty cool, minus the little Chilean girl throwing confetti in my mouth after asking me my name. But the bands were cool and ran into a bunch of Couchsurfers who are always fun to hang out with. The weekend was pretty quiet except for my day trip yesterday which I will try to write about soon up in the mountains outside of Santiago.

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Photos

Naval Monument
in Valparaiso

Grande Lomita
Their sandwiches don't come small!

Chorrialiano
French Fries, plus meat and sausage, onions, and a fried egg...interesting