Three nights in Santiago

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Saturday 14th January - Tuesday 17th January 2023

Checking into our little apartment in Santiago, we wondered why we hadn’t used apartments before now. Spacious with a kitchen, including a kettle and a fridge, meant we could make tea with milk whenever we felt like it! More still, the owner of this flat was really friendly and provided the tea and had a logged in Netflix account on the Tv ready for us to use. Amazing. Maybe a little too amazing, as, after a quick bite to eat at the near by subway, feeling tired, we decided to settle back into the flat for a TV binge before bed.

Fully refreshed the next day though, we headed out early to explore the big capital city of Chile and enjoyed the wide pavements with tall trees, crossings that worked, less traffic and no constant beeping. It was also really quiet generally being a Sunday morning, which gave a calm and chilled atmosphere as we zigzagged along and around the tall buildings.

First stop, the Plaza de Armas, where we found, as expected from some research, a free walking tour about to start. Only a small group of us, the guide walked and talked us around the old square, past the cathedral, palace, many moments and statues, through downtown past graffiti art and the just plain graffiti, through an artesian market area, along a park and to the ancient Mapocho river, stressing its high importance and meaning surrounding their ancestors and how it started the city (now a pretty shallow and milky brown stream), ending at the bottom of huge hill and park full of people.

A pretty interesting but long tour, the sun was now hot and we were hungry, so we found a nice spot to eat with another girl from the tour who was from Brazil. Swapping stories and talking about jobs she was really easy to talk to, gave advice on Rio and even gave us her details as a contact for if needed; how lovely. Now well into the afternoon though, we left her to meet some friends as we headed back to the park thinking it may be quieter now, but we were very much mistaken. Still rammed full of people walking about, with many stood in the queue for the funicular; which is of course what we were planning to do. With no real rush or other near by ideas, we lathered on some more suncream, firmly put on our hats and joined the herd.

It didn’t take long for us to question our decision though, and like others in the queue, we switched between being content and patient with being hot and frustrated at the time it was taking. It then reached a point of no return of course, where we’d invested too much time already so had to stay put and, most annoyingly, watch the locals walk pass us, having been able to buy tickets online (something no tourist seemed able to do with our foreign credit cards…hmmmm). Eventually reaching the counter and paying the higher of two prices (special for foreigners) we finally made it to the funicular. I would of said it looked cool, but with all that time spent waiting, Paul had been looking it up online and found stories of it breaking down and stopping and kids being electrocuted when touching nearby loose cables. It was also clear, on closer inspection, that it was literally being pulled on just one cord with no other safety mechanisms in place for if that cord brakes. Fab.

With an agreed safety plan of sticking to a side and jumping out the cart if needed, we bumbled on with all the others and did manage to enjoy the ride up a little. Reaching the top, the masses grew more with all the people already up there still there, all seeking the few shady spots. There was a great view of the city though, sprawling out further than you can see and covering the land basin the city sits in, with the mountain peaks looming around the edges. The big monument up the top was cool too, particularly as it shared a great name. Having not spent enough time up there to make it worth it really, we were very much ready to head down, and so jumped onto the next bit; the cable car. Providing more views of the other side of the hill, we enjoyed gliding down and watching the people below us, and were soon ready for a drink. After a couple of failed attempts (needing a special ticket, closed, closing, no coffee!) we found a bar and deflated on a seat in the shade for an hour before catching an Uber back to our apartment. What a day.

Day two saw us walking for 40minutes, through some less touristy spots, to a graveyard, and I think that may have been our favourite thing we did in Santiago. Yes you read that right, the local cemetery was maybe the most interesting and coolest thing we saw here. But I don’t mean a local parish churchyard like we have at home, I mean a massive community cemetery with different sections of various headstones, tombs and full on temples for whole families, some decorated with flowers and spinning wheels whilst others were decorated with graffiti and ancient ones being left to ruin, all dotted between exotic trees filled with noisy parakeets; quite the place to wonder round for a while.

Mixing it up, and realising the museums all seemed to be shut on Mondays, we then headed to a huge shopping mall (perhaps the most western we’ve felt since Lima in Peru) and looked up at the tallest building in all of Latin America. We thought about going up it, but the high cost put us off and so we just looked up at it for a bit and got some lunch. Then we headed for the metro line to work out a route back, and found it surprisingly simple and cheap to use.

After another chilled evening at the apartment (enjoying beans and cheese on a jacket potato!) we headed out for our last day here. Another long walk in the other direction, also past some less wealthy areas, and we arrived at Quinta Normal park. A large green space with some pretty flowers, it was a shame a lot of it was not maintained with old water features badly boarded over and wooden decking all cornered off as it fell apart. A few museums here though, we really enjoyed the museum in memory of human rights, giving a well displayed and detailed history of the struggle in Chile with their period of dictatorship.

Leaving a little somber in mood, we used the metro again to head out to a suburb of Santiago to Vino Cousiño Macul. One of the oldest vineyards here, we found a calmness wash over us as we stepped along a gravel path under shady trees with birds tweeting away and the grapes growing in near lines ahead. A friendly welcome relaxed us more, as they handed us a glass of wine to try, and it wasn’t long before we joined others, and a funny and enthusiastic guide, to wonder around the old buildings and caves of where the magic of wine making used to happen (now they produce in another area). Whilst we don’t know much about wine really, it was a fun tour and something fun to do in this area which is known for its wine valleys and we really enjoyed it.

Another metro and taxi though and we soon found ourselves loaded back up with our bags and sat waiting for a night bus. Heading south, we were excited to be getting ever closer to the Patagonia region, and, in just over 12hours time, should find ourselves at the tip of it in the area known as the lakes.

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