Cruising to where?

Valparaiso, Chile

 

Some last few images from Valparaiso...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Tomorrow, after almost a week in the gorgeous city of Valparaiso, we will be boarding our cruise ship bound for the frozen south. From what we can determine, these cruise companies make keeping in touch via Internet a very expensive proposition. As a result, I probably won't be making any new entries in the blog until we arrive in Buenos Aires (don't cheer too loud please).

 

 

For information sake, this is where we should be over the next few weeks...

 

 

 

Before we are completely out of touch, let us wish you all a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. While you are surrounded by friends and family, we will be celebrating in the company of strangers. Happy and sad times all rolled into one.

{GMST}33|2.2|S|071|37.633|W|Valparaiso Harbour, Chile|Valparaiso Harbour, Chile{GEND}

 

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Valparaiso

Valparaiso, Chile

 

The bus last Tuesday, from La Serena to Valparaiso, was pretty uneventful. After leaving an hour and a half late, we somehow still got here on time around 8 PM. The highways in Chile are definitely the best we have seen in Central or South America.

 

Valparaiso is a very picturesque city, built on 42 steep hills surrounding a few blocks worth of flat land along the coast. Walking around this town is a sure way to stay in shape. There are about 15 funicular railways scattered around the city that can make short work of the hills, but anyone who knows Susanne will know that we would never take the easy way up - her "fitbit" has been super happy with her step count ever since we arrived here.

 

Great murals everywhere

On Wednesday we took a free walking tour, from the same company that we used in Santiago. This gave us a very good orientation of the city, which otherwise can be quite confusing when you first arrive. Our hotel is about halfway up one of the hills and we have a pretty good view of the harbour from our room. The only downside so far was that there is some major maintenance going on in the city and the water, for the entire city, was turned off for almost a full 24 hours just after we got here. Everything is OK now though.

 

Today we ventured a little further afield, taking the convenient metro system to the city of Vina del Mar, right next door. While Valparaiso is the cultural center, Vina del Mar is a much more commercial place, full of lots of stores and more conventional hotels and such - not really very touristy but a good place to do some shopping. It was very busy downtown, probably in part because Christmas is almost here.

 

While we were in Vina del Mar, we were able to walk to the nearby yacht club, where we checked out the facilities. Suffice it to say that we would not recommend this place for visiting yachts. The dock itself is subject to a huge amount of surge, with the boats constantly in motion, and there do not appear to be any spare slips anyway. Anchoring outside of the breakwater looks very exposed. The haulout facility uses a crane which would require unstepping the mast and I'm not sure how much weight it could handle, although some of the boats in the yard looked pretty substantial.

 

We will be staying here in Valparaiso until next Monday, the 22nd of December, at which time we will put our clever Christmas and New Year's plan into effect. We have managed to book a last-minute deal on a Holland American cruise ship, which will take us to several of the southern Chile and Argentina ports that we wanted to visit, as well as cruising in the reportedly spectacular fiords. As an added bonus, this boat also cruises to Antarctica and the Falklands, places that we had not really ever thought we would be going. After 20 days at sea, on January 11th, we should arrive at Buenos Aires in Argentina.

 

 

One ridiculous issue that has come up for us is that we do not have an appropriate wardrobe for the cruising lifestyle. I have had to buy some relatively cheap pants and a couple of shirts with collars, in order to be allowed to eat dinner in the dining room on the ship - Susanne has had similar challenges. We will be skipping the "formal" nights and probably keeping a generally low profile while onboard. Our very presence on the ship will probably bring it's class down a notch.

{GMST}33|2.463|S|071|37.7814|W|Valparaiso, Chile|Valparaiso, Chile{GEND}

 

 

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Stargazing

La Serena, Chile

Yesterday we had a very busy day. Not one but two tours in the Elqui valley.

We left early in the morning on a mini-van tour of the nearby Elqui valley. This took us inland as far as the town of Pisco Elqui, stopping along the way at an impressive water-control dam and the largest community in the valley - the town of Vicuña.

Along the way we were treated to a visit, and tasting, at one of the small "Pisco" distilleries that take advantage of the prime grape-growing climate in the valley. It is fascinating that, while it remains cool and overcast on the coast, just 60 kms away it is warm and the skies are clear, with temperatures approaching 30 degrees almost every day. In addition to grapes, there are orchards of citrus fruits and avocados, among other crops.

One of the odd spinoffs of the predominately clear sky and somewhat higher elevations is a bumper crop of celestial observatories littering the hills along the valley. In fact, this has turned into a huge tourist attraction, with several of the installations being set up strictly for visitors. Our second tour of the day took us to one of the most popular sites at the Observatorio Cerro Mamalluca. For this trip, we left the hotel just before dark and were driven to the observatory, just outside the town of Vicuña. We had a perfect clear, moonless night and were able to view several interesting objects through one indoor and one outdoor telescope. We learned a lot about the constellations in the Southern Hemisphere - all of the constellations we are familiar with in Canada are either upside down or missing altogether. We got back to our hotel around 1 AM this morning.

Back in La Serena, today we walked about 5 miles down the beach. There is a lot of construction going on and it is obvious that all of the local businesses are just getting geared up for the approaching summer season. Apparently peak season here is from about mid-December until the end of February. Right now it still seems a little cool to us, although today the sun did make an appearance a little earlier, around noon.

Lifeguards in training

Tomorrow we are leaving this town, heading back south to the city of Valparaiso, where it is reportedly a few degrees warmer. We are looking forward to another 8 hour bus ride.

{GMST}30|2.055|S|070|42.7626|W|Vicuna, Chile|Vicuna, Chile{GEND}
{GMST}29|59.67|S|070|51.67|W|Elqui Valley Dam|Elqui Valley Dam{GEND}
{GMST}30|7.317|S|070|29.6|W|Pisco Elqui, Chile|Pisco Elqui, Chile{GEND}

A cool place to be

La Serena, Chile

 

Yesterday was a longer than expected travel day.

 

We left right on time from the Tur-Bus terminal in Santiago, at 10:51 AM precisely. We were riding on one of the most luxurious buses we have ever been on, in what are called "Salon Cama" seats. The first few hours passed in the expected manner, watching an onboard movie in Spanish (with Spanish subtitles as well), dining on the provided sandwiches and Canada Dry ginger ale, while watching the scenery go by at 100 kph.

Then suddenly it all came to a halt, in what was to turn out to be the first of two breakdowns along the way. In both cases, the driver and mechanics were able to get us going again, but not before we spent over 1-1/2 hours stranded in the middle of nowhere. During the 2nd breakdown, since we were not too far from one of the more major stops, several of the passengers were able to contact friends who came and got them and took them home. Another bus from the same company did come by and pick up a few people as well, but they were not going as far as La Serena. Regardless, we did get there eventually, pulling into the La Sarena bus terminal around 8 o'clock in the evening. Fortunately our hotel was not far away, and it was still light outside - a short taxi ride got us there. This is all part of the adventure.

 

Our hotel is pretty nice and would probably be even better if the weather was a little warmer. This is supposed to be a beach resort but it is overcast for most of the day and the temperature peaks at around 18 degrees in the late afternoon; not what we would normally think of as beach weather. From what we can determine, this is only a couple of degrees cooler than normal for the summer here - that is the effect of the cold Humbolt current that runs northward along this coast, bringing the Antarctic waters as far north as Ecuador. There are people who look like they are sunbathing, lying on towels on the beach, but they are all wearing many layers of clothing. A few brave souls are doing some surfing, in wetsuits of course.

 

 

Today, since we couldn't really lie around on the beach, or by the pool for that matter, we walked into the old part of town to take in some of the charm of this somewhat older city. Of course, we also paid a visit to a local shopping mall to see how the Christmas season is shaping up - it is a lot more subdued than in Santiago.

 

One interesting find was a very nice Japanese garden, a gift from some Japanese steel companies that must do a lot of business here.

 

 

 

{GMST}29|54.6732|S|071|16.431|W|La Serena, Chile|La Serena, Chile{GEND}

 

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