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Published: January 9th 2015
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Santiago is a beautiful city, and our favourite South American city so far. Named after another beautiful city, Santiago de Campostella in Galicia, Spain, in honour of Saint James, Spain’s patron saint; Santiago is a Galician evolution of vulgar Latin, Sanctu Iacobi, Saint James. It is an old city, founded by the Spanish in 1541 and still displays much of its fine colonial architecture alongside high modern towers, like the Gran Torre, the highest building in the continent and second highest in the Southern Hemisphere, after Australia’s Q1. We have spent two days exploring Santiago on foot, and now our legs ache! There is a lot to see!
Just a few minutes along the road from our apartment brought us to the Palacio de Gobierno, the seat of power, a most elegant building, taking up one side of a large plaza. In the centre of the plaza a huge Chilean flag flies and simple, elegant fountains flank the Parliament building. A few blocks to the south, one arrives at the Plaza de Armas and the cathedral. Here also are several museums and the Congress building is nearby; the downtown area with the
major tourist attractions is quite small, although the city is large, housing about five million inhabitants.
The “Cumbre” is a large hill quite near to the centre and the fast-flowing River Mapocho. On its summit is a sanctuary and a large statue of the Virgin and there is a funicular railway to take people up there. The railway has recently celebrated its bicentenary. We bought a one-way ticket, which surprised the guy in the ticket office. “It is a long way back down!” he said (but in Spanish, of course) “…about five kilometres”. We thought that was fine, after all it was all downhill. Well, due to the fact that it was about 35 degrees and there was no shade at all on the hillside, it felt like the longest five kilometres we have ever walked! The views of the city and the snow-capped Andes were stunning, however, so it was worth the discomfort.
Here, as all over South America, dogs live on the street. These Santiago dogs, however, are the brightest we have ever seen; they are completely traffic aware, every one of them. They trot along the pavements until they
get to traffic lights, wait patiently with all of the pedestrians waiting to cross, then when the green man flashes, they walk across the road alongside everyone else. They sleep in doorways and on park benches and they all seem to be well-fed and tolerated amiably by the human inhabitants of this city. They are the epitome of street wise!
Santiago has a really efficient, modern subway. Today we took the metro to the bus terminal to buy our tickets for tomorrow when we depart for Valparaiso. It was even hotter today, 37 degrees, which quite frankly is a bit too hot to be in a city, however beautiful it is, so it will be good to get back down to the coast tomorrow. ¡Adios Santiago!
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