The Trip North: La Serena

This is the first post about our trip during Sam's winter break from teaching. It covers just our time traveling from Talca to La Serena, about a 10 hour stretch by bus. La Serena is a medium sized city on the coast 7 hours north of Santiago. We stayed in the apartment of another English Teaching Assistant, Lucy.

The view from Lucy's apartment's balcony. Nice.

La Serena is known for being a beach resort town, but since we visited during mid-winter, the weather wasn't quite right for getting bronzed. It was still clear and sunny, which was a pleasant change from the weather in Talca, so one day we walked down to the beach. The first picture looks across the bay to La Serena's neighboring city of Coquimbo. A generally more industrial town, Coquimbo is not considered a tourist destination. Sam and I did visit it for an afternoon, mostly to go up the Third Millenium Cross(but more on that later).

The view from La Serena's beach across the bay to Coquimbo.

The view down the beach. What appears to be a lighthouse on the left side of the picture isn't. It's just a sort've cool towery thingy.

During our handful of days in La Serena, Lucy's apartment became headquarters for a squad of gringos(ourselves included) heading various directions on their travels. As we arrived, Lucy was just coming back from the North with Tim, an Argentine ETA, and Andra(Concepcion ETA) and her boyfriend Andy got there a few days before us. Matt(another Talcan ETA) arrived a few days afterwards as did Sade(Valparaiso ETA) and her boyfriend Selvin. Which leads up to the picture below. Sylvan is from Honduras and knows how to make phenomenal tortillas. So he tried to teach us how to make them. Fairly successfully, too.

Lucy, Selvin, Sade, Yours Truly, and Mateo making tortillas.

Sam and I decided we needed to visit Coquimbo, mostly to see and see the view from the top of the Third Millennium Cross, Coquimbo's pride and joy. However, outsiders generally seem to think it an architectural horrorshow, an ugly blot on the skyline. It is a massive structure on the highest point of the hills of Coquimbo. One elevator runs up the middle of the cross. No emergency stairs were available to get down, though a picture in the museum under the cross of the Pope blessing a picture of the cross was comforting in that regard. Constructed during the turn of the millennium, this structure is described by the Rough Guide to Chile in these glowing terms: "the only conceivably redeeming feature is that you can enjoy superb panoramic views of the coast from up here." The guidebook takes a few other pointed jabs at the cross' aesthetics during its Coquimbo section. Guidebooks can often be so unfailing in their praise that it was great to read a sentence like the one above. I had to know: is it really that ugly? And are the views redeeming? Check out the pictures below and you can decide for yourself.

Looking back downhill on the way up to the Third Millennium Cross

Drawing closer to the cross.

In all Its hideous glory.

Agghhhh! The incredible ugliness! But really, it does look both unfinished and prison-like.

The redeeming feature of the cross.

The city streets below the cross.

Looking back across the bay.

Down on the Waterfront in Coquimbo.

Vicuna, about an hour east of La Serena in the mountains, is home to a few world-class astronomy observatories and one giant pisco plant. Pisco is a fierce brandy made in Chile and Peru(both claim that they invented it and that the other's version of pisco totally sucks). We visited Vicuna hoping to take a nighttime observatory tour but it was cloudy in a place renowned for its constant sunshine and clear skies, so we went to the pisco plant instead.

Welcome to Piscoville.

Next Post: Further North!

The North

We are currently travling through the northern half of Chile: La Serena, Bahia Inglesa, Antofagasta, Calama, San Pedro de Atacama(current location) soon Iquique and Arica. Right now, we are in the middle of the Atacama Desert, which most sources claim is the most arid piece of land on Earth. There are places here that have, since people have been keeping track, had no recorded rainfall. None. It is stunningly barren. We will have pictures when we get home. This morning before dawn, we were up at 14,000 feet on the El Tatio Geothermal field. It was about 5-10 degrees Fahrenheit(according to a Chicagoan, not me). Now, we are at 7,000 and it is about 75 degees. Both places, obviously, are quite dry.

Brasil!

About two weeks ago I went to Brasil for the annual Southern Cone conference to meet with the others fellows from Brasil, Uruguay, Argentina and of course Chile. The main goal of the conference was networking which confused me at first, but I quickly realized upon arriving in Brasil meant just a week long vacation. The trip lasted six days. We flew into Sao Paulo and spent two nights in the big city. It is the biggest city in South America with a population that tops Chile as a whole. It was refreshing to be in a big city again brimming with people and culture. We arrived at our hotel during the end of the annual gay pride parade which turned out to be the largest gay pride parade in the world. The streets were mobbed with people I imagine not unlike Carnaval. I kept my camera under wraps not wanting to be robbed, but I did manage to snap a picture of the disgruntled police attempting to keep everything under control:


After wadding our way through the crowds, we were able to find an excellent Lebanese restaurant where we realized that Portuguese is not as close to Spanish as we all imagined. Fortunately, there were no dearth of English speakers to help us order. Two of them even invited us out to a Samba club playing live music. It was amazing: the music, the dancing, the atmosphere. After living with Chileans for so long who are generally very shy and reserved, it was incredibly gratifying to walk out of that Samba club with 10 new best friends. A new friend below!

After Sao Paulo, we were brought to the coast: Barra do Sahy. The beach resort was incredibly beautiful:We took a boat ride to one of the nearby islands to sun on the beach.


And went to a nearby club at night to learn Capoeira. Capoeira is a traditional Afro-Brazilian dance/martial arts/music originating from the era of slavery. In times of slavery, Capoeira was a way the slaves could train to rebel without arising the suspicions of their masters. The dance appears as a battle between two people with kicking, leg sweeps and sometimes even machetes.


Had an excellent time all around and met some really fun people. Below is a picture of some of the other fellows. I have another week and a half before the end of the semester now before Lucas and I head north for our three week adventure in and around the Atacama.

Constitución and the Train

Last weekend, we took the train to Constitución. I'd tell you the day, but I can't remember. I do remember getting up at the most un-Chilean hour of 6:15am to be at the train station a bit before 7am to buy tickets for a 7:30am departure. We had heard rumors that the train filled up early, we needed to be there at 6:45am, etc. Turns out those rumors are possibly true for the summer tourist season, but not for May, when the ticket office opens at 7:05ish and there are 5 people there at the station at time. Those 5 people happened to be the 4 people in the first photo below as well as another of our friends(from England). I think the most notable thing about the train was that it was major-league old. And pretty small. Only two cars. It was the equivalent of a VW bug on rails. A tin can with an wee little eggbeater of an engine. I actually read that the engine produced 180 horsepower before boarding the train, but didn't believe until the train tried to pull away from the station.

Marianne, Me, Sam, and Matt

The train takes a route that heads directly to the coastal town of Constitución. It passes through a number of towns that are inaccessible by road. Which is pretty cool, because it means that this train(which passes twice daily in each direction) is the major form of transportation for about 10 little villages and communities that live along the tracks. The next picture shows the approximate midpoint of the line. A train also leaves Constitución at 7:30am, and this station is the only place where they can pass each other. Both trains pull up, stop, and take a break so everyone can get out, smoke, and chat with their pals on the other train.

Check the rad color scheme

Constitución is a coastal town, and Chile is famous for its mega-earthquakes, which leads to the signs like the one below. Clearly, it instructs one to fly up cliffs if approached by sharp pointy waves.

Fly! or Levitate! Your choice.

With the warnings in mind, we walked through the town of Constitución towards the beach, which is the real attraction. We had been warned that Constitución would smell horribly due to a cellulose plant that operates down near the beach, but we found that only a few small zones smelled like evil, and that the rest of the town and beach were fairly nasally friendly. To the south of town, the beach is covered with rock formations that have been scuplted into pretty cool shapes. The most famous is La Iglesia de Piedra, which I suppose looks somewhat like a church. And it's definitely stone.

Seemingly the only parishioners are the thousands upon thousands of birds who nest on the Church.

Too cute.

Other rocks down around the corner from the Iglesia

These rocks are pretty awesome, and we had them all to ourselves as it was a grey autumn day that was drizzling a bit. We had fun anyway, but it would be a great place to come in the summer and get your bronze on in the company of enormous rocks.

We had a couple meals in Constitución, one of which was tasty seafood, and the other of which led to the picture below. Sorry, I know, I'm 23 now, but I still think it's funny. For those interested, 800 chilean pesos is the equivalent of 1.42USD.

I also know a place in Talca where the price is 900p, but it comes with a drink.

There isn't much to do in Constitución outside of summer, so we headed back to Talca on a late afternoon bus.


On a wholly unrelated note, if anyone was thinking about driving from the US to Talca, I would first refer you to my aunt's excellent blog post on the matter here: http://beyondthetensionline.blogspot.com/2009/04/driving-directions-to-talca.html

New Apartment, Iloca and Pichilemu: A Visual Tour

Pictures of the New Apartment (4 photos, starting from the top and working down): Guestroom, bathroom, bedroom, kitchen/dining room






































































Iloca (2 photos): Coastal beach town.
We took a day trip with some professors from the university.
































Pichilemu: Famous Surf town. We stayed in a boat shaped hostal on the coast, ate yummy Mexican food, went surfing (no pictures), and horse back-riding.

The Fital and Our New Apartment

This weekend we went to the Fital, Talca's version of a state fair. It is advertised as an international fair, but the international elements seemed to be rather limited. Talca's agriculture side played a starring role. As soon as you walked in you found yourself in a lot of tractors and other farming equipment such as seed spreaders and pesticide applicators. There were rides of questionable working order. They all seemed a bit rusty and in varying levels of disrepair. Stray dogs chased the roller coasters and food stands dotted the perimeter selling beer, candy apples and cotton candy. They also had a Cumbia band and a Mexican Ranchero band which brought a large following from the countryside. You could see a lot of people walking around with their cowboy hats and boots. A cowboy in Chile is called a huaso, but the term is apparently somewhat derogatory and not appropriate for foreigners to throw around in the way Chileans seem to do. All of Talca and the surrounding cities seemed to be at the fair. I've never seen such large crowds in this city.

We spent the rest of our weekend scouring furniture and home goods stores to find all the necessities for our new apartment. We couldn't be more excited for the move. We are currently renting a room in a house, but this weekend we will finally be moving into our new apartment. It's in a new sector of the city, so we'll have to re-learn the bus and colectivo system, but it's still close to the university. The apartment is basically a guest house, semi-attached to a family home. It has two bedrooms (or a bedroom and an office) and a pretty basic kitchen and bathroom. It has the majority of the furniture, but we will have to do some shopping to stock the kitchen and fill in whatever gaps.

The best feature of the apartment is probably the fact that the calefont is outside. The calefont is a hot-water heater and anytime you want hot water you have to grab a match and light it. It terrifies me. Before leaving for Chile, I was told multiple stories about people who didn't know how to use them and consequently died. If you don't light it, but keep the gas running, your house will fill up with gas and basically suffocate you. Chilean regulations say the calefont must be outside for safety reasons, but for convenience's sake most are installed within the house so you don't have to go out in the rain with a set of matches everytime you want hot water. Lucas is slightly peeved that our calefont is outside, but I will personally sleep more soundly at night knowing that my calefont is less likely to kill me.

And below is a picture from orientation of me throwing a pot with some local potters outside of Santiago:

Valparaiso

This last weekend we spent Friday and Saturday nights in Valparaiso, which is due west of Santiago. As Wikipedia says, "built upon dozens of steep hillsides overlooking the Pacific Ocean, Valparaiso boasts a labyrinth of streets and cobblestone alleyways, embodying a rich architectural and cultural legacy." Enter Figure 1a. This image demonstrates the Pacific Ocean, a bit of the steep hillsides and a small degree of rich architectural legacy.

Figure 1a: A few of the hills of Valparaiso

There are a few less than 20 distinct hills of Valparaiso, all of which are situated around a flat area next to the ocean. The lower area is the commercial centre, and houses are stacked willy-nilly upon the hills. Our hostel for the weekend was in Cerro Concepcion. Cerro Concepcion was considered some years ago to be a good example of the "real" Valparaiso. This means it became attractive to classes of citizens with increasing amounts of wealth, turning "real" Valparaiso into what it is today: a pleasant, safe semi-bohemian area with some slick fusion restaurants. The hostel was quiet and rad, for it had three nice cats. These cats, while fully grown, were a bit small compared to what I'm used to. The cat that currently resides at home in California generally pushes the scale at somewhere in the 20lb range. And he's not fat, just big-boned. These cats couldn't have been more than 5lbs.

Many people talk about the bohemian nature of Valparaiso, but the only evidence I could see of that was some pretty street art. Figures 1b, 1c, and 1d were all on our walk up on down Cerro Concepcion. The cat in the window in figure 1b is a skinny doppelganger of the 20lb cat discussed above, by the way.

Figure 1b: Note the cat.

Figure 1c

Figure 1d

On Saturday we visited La Sebastiana, one of Pablo Neruda's three houses that are restored and administered as museums. The other two are in Santiago and Isla Negra, about 45 minutes south of Valparaiso. His houses are collections of the strange items that he gathered in a lifetime spent traveling around the world. Like a stuffed penguin he kept on his bar. Unfortunately, we couldn't take pictures inside the house, so we can't show you the awesomeness. But it was awesome.

The best thing to do in Valparaiso as a tourist, though, is to simply wander around and marvel at the brightly colored houses built on the hillsides. It is tiring to walk up and down streets and stairs, but thankfully the city built a set of funicular elevators to help citizens up and down the steepest hills. Called ascensores in Spanish, some of them are over a 100 years old, and all of them look like rickety death traps. They are fragile wooden boxes that are pulled upwards by steel cables at an angle between 20 and 70 degrees. Figure 1e shows the view looking up from Ascensor Espiritu Santo.

Figure 1e: Looking upwards from the window of Ascensor Espiritu Santo

Here are a few other images from the weekend. Figure 1f shows the five of us from Talca enjoying a stately boat ride around the Valparaiso harbor.

Figure 1f: Me, Stefanie, Sam, Kerry, Marianne

Figure 1g shows a fuzzy dog and his fuzzy sweater we found on the way to La Sebastiana. Clearly a stray, he still looked pretty comfy both days we saw him.

Figure 1g: Fuzzywuzzy wuz his name

Figure 1h is the of a plate of chorrillana. It is some red meat, stacked on a layer of fried eggs and onions, stacked on some french fries. We had it a couple times, including at a restaurant that only served chorrillana. Mmmboy!

Figure 1h: Matt, Chorrillana, me

I'll finish this post by mentioning that we did get to the beach. It was the first time I've been in the water south of the equator, and the Pacific seemed pretty much the same as home. Cold, clear, and there were the same little crabs burrowed in the sand at water's edge that we see in Carpinteria. Just like home.