Santiago and how we almost missed Easter Island - Santiago, Chile
Santiago, Chile
The 14 December we woke up to a great blue sky over Valparaiso and set out to discover the winding streets and alleys of the city. The city is built over several hills, a bit like San Francisco, and there are wall paintings on virtually every wall, so there is plenty to see while just walking around. Outside, we soon realized that a bit of sun makes the city a lot more charming as it brings out all the bright colors of the houses, which don’t really show on a cloudy day like the day before. So just like that, our appreciation for the place grew quite a lot.
We started by visiting a couple of squares that the guy at the hotel recommended and then went to an ex-prison turned into a museum. There, we were given a free, private tour of an art exhibition by a very enthusiastic art student who didn’t seem to understand a polite “no, thank you”. It was all interesting enough, but we hadn’t planned to spend as much time at the exhibition as we ended up doing.
From the museum, we made our way down the hill towards the restaurant J. Cruz which claims to have invented the chorrillana, the most typical dish from the area. It’s basically a mountain of french fries, covered with beef, onion and fried eggs. It’s also the only thing on the menu, so we went for a plate for two and it was all good enough, though we tried not to count the calories we were eating. With the food we tried a drink called terremoto, meaning earthquake, made with grenadine, pineapple ice cream and pipeño wine. Pretty good and we decided to share one, which still became what we considered a normal sized drink each. That turned out to be a good decision since the name comes from the fact that when you stand up, it’s supposed to feel like an earthquake, which especially Max nonetheless got to experience when we left the restaurant. We later learnt that if you order a second one, they’ll bring you a smaller one and call it a temblor, meaning aftershock.
After lunch we went for a short walk along the water before joining a free (or well, tip-based) tour of the center in the afternoon. Very interesting and in a few hours our great guide, Felipe, took us through most of the interesting points of the city. Apart from all the wall paintings we saw, we also had the time to learn a bit about the city in general, ride one of the funiculars running up and down the hills, grab a freshly fried empanada and try pisco sours at a local shop. Towards the evening, we took the funicular back up the hill to our hostel, wise from our mistake the day before when we walked all the way up with the backpacks.
The next day, the 15 December, we packed up our stuff, bought some empanadas and headed to the Valparaiso bus terminal. On the way, we got an unexpected last ride up through the hills because we missed our bus stop, but still got to the bus terminal without too much trouble. There, we bought our tickets for the next bus to Santiago and hopped on the bus soon after. Early afternoon, we arrived at one of Santiago’s four bus terminals and could get on the metro to the center. There, we found our hostel with the help from some friendly locals.
Having dropped off our bags, we went for a walk to Plaza de Armas. On the way we bought some very cheap ice cream and passed quite a few interesting buildings. The square itself is something like the heart of the city, full of people socializing and playing chess, and at this time of the year it was nicely decorated with a few quite original Christmas trees. Around it are also quite a few of the tourist attractions, but we targeted a completely different building, namely the Correo Central, or the main post office of the city. There, we were hoping to find a nice little letter from Kajsa’s parents in Sweden. Unfortunately, the less than helpful people at the post office couldn’t find anything in our name and we had to turn back empty handed and try our luck another day.
After this temporary disappointment, we made a quick visit to a shopping mall in the area and went back to the hostel. There, we spent the evening watching a Republican debate on CNN. After a while, we were joined by a few other guests and had quite a few laughs together before we went to sleep.
The following day, the 16 December, we had quite a late start and began by visiting the ice cream shop Emporio La Rosa, which is supposed to one of the 25 best in the world. There, we had some delicious gelato, though the famous odd flavors were absent and Kajsa thought it still didn’t beat the ice cream in Rome. Then, we walked towards the center and got rid of some of the calories by climbing Cerro Santa Lucia, the hill where the city was founded in 1541. Today, it has some interesting facades and a decent view of the city.
Afterwards, we went back to the post office at Plaza de Armas for another attempt to get the package, but still no luck. Fortunately, we have quite a lot of time in the city so there’s still hope. While we were at the square, we also took the opportunity to visit the Catedral Metropolitana, the city’s cathedral. There was a mass going on so we didn’t stay very long, but it’s definitely a lot bigger than it seems when you see it from the outside.
From the square, we walked to the Mercado Central, but only for a quick look since we were still full from the ice cream. Then, we walked past the Plaza de la Constitucion and Palacio La Moneda, the presidential palace, before starting to make our way back to the hostel. On the way, we asked around in a few bakeries for fresh yeast and eventually found it in a supermarket, where we also did the rest of our shopping.
The evening we spent at the hostel, trying to bake hamburger bread and “lussekatter”. With a bit of improvisation on the tools, it actually worked out surprisingly well. Sadly, the hostel only had an oven with heat from the bottom, so the result was not quite as esthetically appealing as we’re used to, but there was nothing wrong with the taste and that’s what matters most after all. With a bag full of “lussekatter” to be eaten over the next few days, we then went to sleep, full but happy.
Our second full day in Santiago, the 17 December, we began the day with some “lussekatter” for breakfast. Then, we went to take the funicular up the Cerro San Cristobal, the highest hill in the city. There, we enjoyed some ice cream and a good view of the city under a blue sky. The city is really surrounded by mountains or high hills on all sides as far as we could see. Then, we made a quick visit to Santiago’s equivalent to Christ the Redeemer in Rio, a statue of the Virgin Mary on top of the hill, before taking the funicular back down again.
Once we were at the bottom, we then climbed part of the way back up again to visit the zoo that is located on the side of the hill. Somewhat surprisingly, this was probably the best zoo we’ve been to in terms of animal welfare. All the cages were large and perfectly clean, the animals looked incredibly healthy and the visitors generally showed a lot of respect. Also, apart from the typical zoo animals, there were a lot of local, Chilean animals. We spent a couple of hours walking up and down the paths inside and then left, positively surprised.
The afternoon we spent walking through the neighborhood Bellavista and visiting the Patio Bellavista, which is full of little shops and restaurants. We also had time for a walk to the heladeria Bravissimo, known from Kajsa’s parents’ diary, where we shared an enormous cone of ice cream. Then, we went back to the hostel and eventually had some hamburgers with homemade bread from the day before.
The morning after, the 18 December, we got up at 3 for a birthday call to Jean-Luc, Max’ dad. Later, after a few more hours of sleep, we went out and started by visiting the Centro Artesanal Santa Lucia. The place doesn’t look like much from the outside and we had actually passed it several times before without finding it interesting, but once you get inside it’s quite a nice little market full of stalls where they sell all sorts of handicrafts. We never actually bought anything, but settled for walking around the little streets for a while and checking out our options.
From the market, we continued to the center where we found a cinema and watched an early afternoon showing of the new Star Wars movie. We both found it to be decent, though not as good as the old ones and a bit too much copy paste from previous movies. After the movie, we made a third but still fruitless attempt to pick up our package from the post office at Plaza de Armas. Emptyhanded, we then continued to La Moneda cultural center just next to the presidential palace, where we did a quick walkthrough but decided there was nothing for us there.
Instead, we took the metro to the end of the line and the Los Dominicos handicraft market. It’s a nice place, almost like a little village, full of shops selling really high quality things. Since we had plenty of time, we went through practically every shop and in the end left with a copper bracelet and a handwoven blanket made of alpaca wool from the Atacama Desert. Content with our purchases, we then took the metro back to the center and our hostel.
The 19 December, Max had set his eyes on the amusement park Fantasialand in the center of Santiago, so we began the day by walking there. From afar, we could see the attractions were open and had good hopes of being able to go, but on arriving at the gates we were informed that there was a private event and we wouldn’t be let inside the park. We considered bribing the guard to let us in anyway, but since the Chileans have a reputation for being honest people we decided that it might be a bad idea and let it go.
A little disappointed, we instead got on the metro for quite a long ride to Plaza de Puente Alto in the Maipo valley. There, we walked along the road out of the city to the winery of Concha y Toro, the largest one in Chile and one of the major attractions in and around Santiago. As expected, it was quite touristy, but we decided to give the tour a try anyway. In hindsight, this was probably a mistake since it was one of the worst tours we’ve ever had. Not only did the guide show very clearly that she didn’t care about us, she also led a tour where it seemed like the only purpose was to take pictures, we learnt close to nothing about making wine or the winery and she was downright rude to several visitors who dared to ask her questions. The only fun part of the tour was the light show at the end down in the Casillero del Diablo, or the devil’s cellar, where the devil lives according to the legend. Apparently, the legend was created to keep thieves away, but nonetheless the cellar has given its name to the flagship wine of the winery. The tastings at the end were alright as well, with a white and two red wines, but quite frankly the free tours we did in Cafayate were all better and more interesting. Fortunately, we’re travelling in the age of the Internet and can get our revenge on Tripadvisor later.
When the tour was done, we took a combination of bus and metro back to the center and stopped at Bravissimo to compensate for the disappointments of the day. There, we shared a large ice cream in the sun before beginning the walk back to the hostel. Of course, since ice cream makes everything better, we returned to the hostel at least a little happier. At the hostel, we donated the souvenir glasses from the winery to their collection and then spent the evening preparing for the flight to Easter Island the next day.
Then came the 20 December, the day when we were finally going to go to Easter Island. We woke up at 6, happy and ready to just take our bags and go. However, a few minutes and an email later, we were instead sitting quite devastated on the bed with our flight cancelled. The reason was a strike that shut down most of the airports in the country and, had we been reading Chilean news, we could have expected it since this was the fifth day of the strike. Unfortunately, we had read nothing and there was no mention of a strike when we checked in the evening before, so the surprise added a bit extra to the blow.
We then spent the morning half-depressed cancelling hotel reservations, trying to change flights and figuring out what to do next. Sadly, the next flight we could take wasn’t until the 3 January and we had no intention of spending two more weeks in Santiago, so we ended up cancelling our reservation and it started to look like we might miss one of the highlights of our trip.
It seems some days things are just meant to go wrong, and this was one of those days. The flight was obviously the worst, but far from the only thing that went wrong this day. To begin with, our hostel had no room for us and so around midday, we had to move to another one. There, we got a room with a broken doorknob and, just as we had gotten installed, the guy realized he couldn’t fix it so we had to move to another one. Then, the wifi kept crashing so we couldn’t even stay in bed and just depression watch movies, which was really all we wanted to do at this point. To make it even better, the hostel had a cat that Kajsa was allergic to, and things continued in the same manner until we eventually went to sleep, happy that the day was finally over. Then, we had done a lot of looking around but still found no really good solution for how to get to Easter Island, so the future of that project seemed most uncertain.
Fortunately, some days things actually do work out. As it seems, yesterday, the 21 December, was one of those. When getting up in the morning, we realized that the airport strike was suddenly over and went to check if there was any way to get new plane tickets. With a bit of luck and some help from the airline that put in extra flights, we found two tickets for two days later at about the same price as we had paid for the old ones. This meant we had to change our plans a bit and stay as long as eight days on Easter Island, going back to Santiago just as the new year begins, but we think it will be worth it and give us time to properly discover all there is to see. Most of all, we’re just happy that we’ll actually be going.
With the goal of the day achieved, we then spent some time booking a hotel and fixing practicalities. In the afternoon, we went out with the intention of visiting a few museums, but these turned out to be closed. Instead, we took a walk through the center, bought some ice cream and eventually returned to the hostel towards the evening. There, we spent a calm evening and learnt that the dog of the hostel was named Zlatan.
Today, the 22 December, we spent the morning making preparations and buying most of our food for Easter Island to avoid paying a fortune for it there. In the afternoon, we went to the Parque Quinta Normal to make another attempt at visiting a couple of the museums in the area. However, once we got there, we found that all the museums were closed because of a strike. We’re almost starting to wonder if it’s a trend at the moment, or if they’re just taking the opportunity to get some extra Christmas holidays. Either way, we had to settle for another walk through the center and another, and possibly last, ice cream at Bravissimo. We also had the time for another visit to the post office where we learnt that our chance of getting the package is close to zero because of some very picky customs regulations. A little sad since we were really looking forward to having some Swedish candy, but we’ll try one last time when we get back.
Tonight, we’ll make some final preparations and tomorrow, we’re finally flying to Easter Island!
FRANCAIS
Lundi 14 Décembre, visite du quartier autour de l'hôtel. Visite d'une ancienne prison reconvertie en musée d'art. Notre curiosité nous a poussé vers une exposition organisée au dernier étage. Les étudiants en dernière année d'école d'art présentait leur projet final. Une jeune fille était présente et nous a présenté chaque projet. Par la suite, nous nous sommes dirigés vers le restaurant J.Cruz, l'un des plus célèbres de Valparaiso. La spécialité maison est le Chorillana, un énorme plat de frites maison, des oignons, des œufs et de la viande de bœuf. Juste délicieux. Pour accompagner le plat, nous avons essayé la boisson locale, le Terremoto, littéralement "séisme". Une boisson alcoolisée composée de vin blanc pipeño, de grenadine et de sorbet à l'ananas. Le nom s'explique puisque, lorsqu'on est assis, on ne sent pas l'effet de l'alcool caché derrière le sucre... Mais lorsque l'on se lève, on sent la terre trembler. Maxime, avec seulement 1/2 verre était KO. Kajsa a même ressenti les effets ce qui est un exploit. Tour de la ville avec un guide dans l'après-midi, guide excellent par ailleurs connaissant plein d'anecdotes croustillantes. Retour à l'hôtel.
Mardi 15 Décembre, départ pour Santiago. Visite nous souhaitée de la banlieue de Valparaiso puisque le chauffeur a oublié de nous dire quand descendre pour trouver le terminal de bus. Arrivée à Santiago, petit tour de métro, un peu de marche et arrivée à notre hôtel. Juste le temps de poser nos affaires et direction la place d'armes de Santiago, afin de récupérer un colis envoyé par Karin et Palle. N'ayant pas le numéro de paquet, nous sommes rentrés à l'hôtel. En chemin, arrêt aux stands, petite glace et ravitaillement en pâtes pour la soirée. Le programme de la soirée,humour et politique, un débat du parti républicain était retransmis sur CNN. Pour ceux qui ne connaissent pas... Les républicains sont des tarés. Le débat était concentré sur la nécessité de nettoyer la Syrie avec un "tapis de bombe", je cite. Bref très bonne soirée même si les déclarations des candidats ne laissent pas présager un futur de paix.
Mercredi 16 Décembre, visite de la ville de Santiago. Début de la visite par une bonne glace chez l'un des meilleurs glaciers du monde. Puis visite de Cerro Santa Lucia, une colline en pleine ville, transformée en jardin, avec une vue panoramique sur la ville. Retour au bureau de poste de la veille, mais toujours pas de paquet. Visite de la cathédrale en pleine messe puis du marché de la ville. Visite du palais présidentiel et de la place de la constitution. Balade aléatoire dans la ville puis retour à l'hôtel pour preparer des hamburgers maison et des patisseries suedoises des "lussekatter".
Jeudi 17 Décembre, outre l'anniversaire de mariage de Jean-Luc et Christine :), visite du nord de la ville. Ascension de Cerro de San Cristobal en "funicular", un genre de cabine d'ascenseur à 45 degrés fonctionnant par câble. Au sommet la statue de la vierge Marie de Santiago, monument très connu de la ville. A proximité, le zoo de Santiago. Probablement le meilleur zoo que Maxime ait visité. De nombreux animaux, guanacos, tigres blancs, éléphants, pandas roux, pingouins, otaries et autres flamands roses, tous en bonne santé et visiblement très bien traités. De grandes cages confortables, des soigneurs aux petits soins, bref ça fait plaisir à voir. Le reste de l'après-midi, balade dans le quartier de Bellavista et arrêt un peu plus loin, chez le glacier Bravissimo, sur recommandation de Karin.
Vendredi 18 Décembre, début de journée très tôt, vers 3h pour souhaiter un joyeux anniversaire à Papa Jean-Luc. Puis escalade de la butte Santa Lucia pour apprécier une magnifique vue sur la ville. Ensuite cinema, passage obligatoire pour voir le dernier Star Wars. Passage rapide au Centre culturel de la Moneda, le palais présidentiel Chilien. Un peu de métro jusqu'au marché des Dominicains à l'est de la ville, un marché d'artisanat. Les bracelets de cuivre sont une spécialité locale ainsi que la laine. Nous avons craqué pour un bracelet et une magnifique couverture en laine d'Alpaca, encore et toujours de l'Alpaca.
Samedi 19 Décembre, tentative de visite du parc d'attraction local. Mais le parc était réservé :( pour un événement privé. Donc solution de secours, 1h30 de métro direction le sud de Santiago pour visiter les vignobles. Concha y Toro, une marque très connue, produisant le célèbre Casillero del Diablo. Visite sommaire du parc du propriétaire historique et des vignobles. La guide ayant la franchise de montrer, par son attitude, qu'elle s'en fichait complètement. Dégustation d'un premier vin blanc . Puis visite des caves et petit spectacle son et lumière expliquant le nom Castillero del Diablo. Les locaux pensaient que le vin était si bon que le diable visitait souvent la cave. Un jour, des voleurs ont pris quelques bouteilles... Et paf. Donc depuis personne n'a volé de bouteille là-bas. Préparation pour le voyage pour l'île de Pâques le lendemain.
Dimanche 20 Décembre, la journée de la Scoumoun comme dirait ma tante Sylvie. Après lecture des emails, nous réalisons que notre avion a été annulé pour cause de grève des aéroports. Le temps d'appeler le SAV, pas d'avion disponible avant le 3 Janvier, donc remboursement. Nous décidons, de rester 2 jours de plus pour organiser la suite, plus de places à l'hôtel, ça continu. Changement d'hôtel, recherche de toutes les solutions mais rien ne vient. Même internet ne fonctionne pas, chien et chat dans l'hôtel alors que Kajsa est allergique, changement de chambre puisque la porte est cassée, ect... La journée où il faut rester couché.
Lundi 21 Décembre, Kajsa apprend en lisant les journaux que la grève est terminée et que la compagnie aérienne multiplie les vols dans les prochains jours. Donc nous pouvons partir pour un prix quasi équivalent aux billets précédents. Bonne nouvelle donc. Balade en ville le reste de la journée et dégustation de glaces.
Mardi 22 Décembre, préparation pour le voyage. Le matin, grosses courses pour éviter de tout acheter sur l'île où la vie est très chère. Balade en ville l'après-midi pour apprécier une bonne glace meringue/chocolat noir pour Maxime et mangue/banana split pour Kajsa.