Blogs from Vicuna, Coquimbo Region, Chile, South America - page 2

Tuolla rannikollahan käy niin että yöllä merelle muodostuu pilviä ja vasta iltapäivällä selkenee. Niin kävi ainakin Concepcionissa ja Viñassa. Koska haluan nähdä kunnolla tähtiä, päätin tänään mennä sisämaahan. Rinkka sai jäädä Coquimboon: otin mukaan vain mustan repun. Olin ensin ajatellut Vicuñan kaupunkia, mutta Marco kehotti menemään kauemmas, aina Pisco Elqui -nimiseen kylään asti. Pysähdyin kuitenkin Vicuñaan, jotta sain ladattua lisää saldoa kännykkääni ja käytyä netissä. Jatkoin sitten bussilla eteenpäin kylään nimeltään Pisco Elqui. Kävin rasvaamassa itseni lähimmässä baarissa ja aloin etsi majoitusta, kävelin kadulle, jolla majapaikkoja piti olla. Loysin sattumalta niitäkin halvemman: http://www.hostaltriskel.cl/index.htm Yhden hengen huone on 7000 pesoa. Suihku ja vessat ovat yhteiset. Kävin lounaalla ja otin päiväunet. Kävin plazalla. Join ananasmehun: oli hyvää. Innost... read more

Hola - Day four Anthony´s father and friends headed south to fly fish and Anthony and I decided to head north to the Elqui Valley. We took a 6 hour bus (around 20 bucks) to La Sarena where we immediately took a local bus deep into the valley to Vicuña. Vicuña is the pisco producing capital of Chile. As luck would have it Vicuña was celebrating Carnival the day we arrived. There was an endless street market selling everything from kichen supplies to empenadas to car parts. The entire town is probably 10 square blocks and in the center, the plaza, was a huge crowd lining every street. Hari Krishna´s chanted and bounced, men on fancy bicycles sold ice cream and cotton candy and then the floats started. every float was of local significance starting with ... read more

After last night's excitement, a more sedate day today. No point going into much detail: we caught a couple of buses the 300-and-something miles down to Santiago, we checked into our hostel ‘La Chimba’ - in the late night Bellavista area - and were asked if we had any questions… We had one very important question: is there a good Indian restaurant in Santiago? The answer, thank God (as we had been thinking and talking about a curry for about 6 days now), was ‘yes’, so we headed out to the Majestic Best Western on Santa Domingo. We used to eat a curry about once a week in London but, alas, have only had Seattle’s distinctly average effort on our trip so far. Tonight’s curry was, without exaggeration, absolutely amazing. So our advice to anyone heading ... read more