19th – 22nd January

Santiago

22 hours later we arrived by bus in Santiago. It felt kind of familiar and alien at the same time as it hasn’t been since London we had been in a ‘modern’ capital (La Paz whilst great had a distinct chaos about it) so we were ready to fill our boots with good food, wine and beer. We were very lucky to have checked into lovely self contained apartments a very chilled part of town called Barrio Lastarria (the closest we can think of in London is maybe the South Bank or perhaps Eccelsall Road in Sheffield) with lots of bars, coffee shops and restaurants near by and always filled with good looking / holidaying Chileans to the early hours – we obviously fitted in on both counts 😉

The remainder of our first day was spent walking up the single hill in the Cerrio Santa Lucia (park) for views over the neighbourhood and a little siesta in the sun (clearly we weren’t as rested from the bus journey as we thought or were we now just proper backpackers?) before finishing the day with tapas and drinks in a local bar – Mamboleta- amazed at how busy it was for a Sunday night.

On the Monday we set out to explore the city and soon learnt 2 things: 1 – most tourist attractions are closed for the day including the museum and funicular (both of which we’d got up early to do!) 2 – all the major plazas in Santiago are closed for refurbishment until April. Unperturbed we headed round all the parks for more sun and ice cream and before heading back to our apartment. It was on our walk that we really started to appreciate this modern and confident South American city.

We also discovered that at traffic lights Santiago doesn’t have beggars or screen washers asking for money, but some very talented street performers and musicians (including a brass band) who step out into the street when the lights turn red to entertain the drivers for cash – ingenious and entertaining.

After a chilled day out it was time to spend the next 2 hours with the receptionist back at the apartments trying to find a way from Santiago to Bariloche (in Argentina) that included a trip to Lake District in Chile now we are ‘freestyling’. After securing our passage to Argentina we headed out to a local restaurant ‘Sur Patagonia’ for steak and a Chilean wine – a delicious end to the day!

Vina del Mar / Valparaiso / Vino

Road trip!!! We were picked up at 9.30 sharp for our ‘group’ tour of two local towns and a vineyard…only to find it was to be a cosy foursome with just the two of us, our driver ‘Nelson’ and guide ‘Antonio’ (we think…they spoke very fast!) After a crash course in some Chilean phrases (huevon meaning big egg is a term of endearment don’t you know!), we wondered what lay ahead as we stopped of at some rip off roadside restaurant while our guides had coffee and we realised we had to pay to breathe. Luckily, the day fast remedied itself as we travelled through tunnels, past vineyards and mountains to reach the seaside town of Vina del Mar. Antonio had verbal diarrhoea and told us so many facts in such a short amount of time Jase had to have a siesta behind his sunglasses! We stopped to have our photo taken in front of the pretty floral clock at the centre of town (electric and plays different music according to the occasion apparently…) before a whistle stop tour of the streets and past the first casino. At the seafront we stopped and ran to dip our feet in the Pacific as numerous holidaymakers sunbathed (and worked out?!). Bliss. Would have been so so easy to have kicked back, lain down and stayed for a week…

But onwards. Back in the car we sailed past a building our guide couldn’t wait to point out looked like something from Harry Potter (in a very funny English accent!) and past hundreds of the Dakar rally cars lined up to be shipped out. In 15 mins we had reached the older, more historical town of Valparaiso. It was much bigger than we’d thought, buildings piled on buildings, especially in the financial centre where glorious architecture was almost strangled by apartment blocks. We passed parks, graffiti, battleships (Valparaiso is still the second most important port in Chile) and markets before heading up the hill for some great views and a stroll with Antonio. He took us to the Lutherian Church with an amazing organ and we met with the pastor who was fascinating (part Swedish, been in the navy, spoke with an almost American accent and told us of all the great works they do in the community). We walked past ‘Brighton’, a restaurant/ hotel with a veranda overlooking the heart of the city where people go to have drinks and listen to the music of the square and went to an art gallery. And of course we walked past the brightly coloured houses the town is known for and which their inhabitants must always keep the same or risk losing their UNESCO funding…

Meeting up with Nelson, we then headed back to the Casablanca valley to the Indomina vineyard (owned by the same people who own part of a Chilean bank, newspaper and pretty much anything else you can think of). The drive up was beautiful, past the rows and rows of vines, to the house on the hill.

We first went for a delicious and surprisingly reasonable lunch (plus a cheeky glass of wine of course!) before we met with Sebastian who came to show us round. He took us to the vines and explained how the vineyard is only really 14 years old and it takes 3-4 years to start yielding wine. They they usually harvest from late February for the younger ‘varietal’ wines (though due to a frost last year it’ll likely be mid march) which work well in the ‘colder’ climate esp whites like sav blanc, Chardonnay or light reds like Pinot noir. He then took us to see the big vats and explained the difference in process between the varitetals and premiums which need more of the skins etc, plus showed us the science bit where they change the taste, alcohol vol etc according to the customer (e.g. Marks and Spencers!). A visit to the barrel room was the followed by a session in the tasting room. Just the three of us, in a oak doored room overlooking the vineyard with a Sauvignon blanc, a Pinot noir and a premium ‘douette’ cab sav. Delicious.

After reluctant goodbyes we headed back into town and were dropped off at our apartment. A brief admin pitstop preceded yet another dinner (where Jase ate vacuna) in a courtyard of restaurants just around the corner, topped off by a Pisco Sour Chilean style (apparently the lemons are bigger and sweeter than Peru….)

Santiago

Our bus on the final day wasn’t due to leave until 21.20 which left us all day to do the things we couldn’t do on Monday. Starting the day with our first ‘proper’ coffee and pan de chocolate at ‘The Wonderful Coffee Shop’ we headed out to Bella Vista (think of Hoxton) where we caught the funicular up to the top of Cerro San Cristóbal and took in the views over the sprawling city of 6m people before heading back down into for lunch…

In Chile, hot dogs are an art. Forget an over priced Jamie Oliver hotdog at £5+, for the equivalent of 70p from a street vendor we got a full ‘Italiano’ hotdog so called as the toppings of avocado, mayo and tomato resemble the Italian flag.

Full and happy we headed through the busy streets to do our cultural bit in the Museo de Pre Columbia where we spent a couple hours in what is regarded as Chile’s best museum before heading back to barrio Lasterria with 3 hours to kill drinking beer and having a fine Italian meal (who said you always needed to slum it when backpacking).

Oh and we did learn another thing today – the Spanish for mucus (very useful and don’t ask why…).