The journey to Santiago on the 12th January was good, not because of the food offered - a super sweet black coffee or 'cafécito' and a cookie - but because we took the 9 hour journey during the day. As Larry had mentioned to Robin on Facebook recently, "night-buses are a false economy". This is true; we have suffered 4 journeys of endless swaying in the darkness, arriving at stupid-o'clock in the morning, needing desperately to recover by crashing out for a few hours, thereby wasting most of the first day anyway. We left Temuco at 7.30 am and actually got to see the landscape of the country we were visiting (including a volcano undergoing a small-scale eruption - the dark clouds and haze in the picture below are the dust and ash...)
To be fair, some of the night-buses in Argentina really would not have been exciting as day rides - from Puerto Madryn to Esquel would have been painfully boring after the first hour or so, as it is barren desert and scrub most of the way). However, as long as there has been something to see, we have always enjoyed the 5 hour bus journeys, so it makes sense that a 9 hour one would be worth it too, it's only taken us 6 weeks to figure this out!
(Horse Trials: We stretched our legs for 5 minutes at Chillán bus station, where there was a hawker selling pastries and the like. He also had packets of jerky... having heard about llama jerky, we thought we would give it a try. Having succesfully purchased, we were about to tear open the packet when we noticed the picture of a horses head on it, and not that of a llama as you might expect. Needless to say, we wimped out, and exchanged it for a couple of empanadas. These had an unfamiliar taste and unrecognisable filling...)
We passed though the valley that lies between the Andes cordillera and the Pacific Cordillera mountain ranges. It is wide and flat and green. There are countless farms with the now familiar scene of fileds of corn rows and herds of cows. These small holdings interspersed the far greater commercial farms growing all types of fruit and vegetables. As we approached Santiago the vegetable and fruit crops gave way soley to vineyards.
Fantastic. Why had it not dawned on us sooner that we were diving head first into Latin America's most well known wine glass? First thing on our 'to do list' was to head for the vineyard of international brand 'Concha y Toro'. The location was very handy from the city of Santiago, being just a short taxi ride away from the last underground metro stop. Nowadays this historic 'viña' is more the commercial head quarters of the company, sited in the old grounds of the original. The buildings and gardens date from the 1820's, and are very picturesque. The experience was informative, if only to realise what huge outfits the winemakers of Chile have become, the sales pitch video at the start of the tour further enhanced the commerciality of it all. But you know, I'm not grumbling, we got to taste three very nice bottles. Unfortunately not the whole bottle though.
One of the wines we quaffed is known at home, called 'Casillero del Diablo', which comes in a variety of 'flavours' (okay, so I don't know the lingo yet....) or grapes.
Santiago is a pretty pleasing city, with a back drop of the Andes. Beautiful. If you could see them. The city suffers from smog, and the protected mountain ranges surrounding it are barely visible most of the time, even when we took the daft funicular to the top of Cerro San Cristóbal, one of the many hills that pop from nowhere from the flat cityscape. At the top of the Cerro is 14m high statue of the Virgen Mary, a small chapel, and piped choral music. A little surreal.
The hostal we stayed at was another dorm bunk experience, but this time sharing with 5 others. The breakfast was a DIY affair of yogurt, wholemeal bread, fruit, juice, tea/coffee. I mention this because breakfast is of such insignificance to latin americans that the offering to hungry travellers is often pretty meagre. We had a couple of great evenings chatting to folk from Sweden, Austria, Germany, and an Italian who had been living in Archway just up the road from Holloway. The down point was that Charles, the American owner, and his hobo helpers from the US and Canada (people work in hostels in exchange for board while travelling) didn't really understand the concept of cleanliness....the kitchen floor wouldn't even know what a mop was. The sheets were clean though and the intermittent showers sufficient!
Hannah
(Horse Trials: We stretched our legs for 5 minutes at Chillán bus station, where there was a hawker selling pastries and the like. He also had packets of jerky... having heard about llama jerky, we thought we would give it a try. Having succesfully purchased, we were about to tear open the packet when we noticed the picture of a horses head on it, and not that of a llama as you might expect. Needless to say, we wimped out, and exchanged it for a couple of empanadas. These had an unfamiliar taste and unrecognisable filling...)
We passed though the valley that lies between the Andes cordillera and the Pacific Cordillera mountain ranges. It is wide and flat and green. There are countless farms with the now familiar scene of fileds of corn rows and herds of cows. These small holdings interspersed the far greater commercial farms growing all types of fruit and vegetables. As we approached Santiago the vegetable and fruit crops gave way soley to vineyards.
Fantastic. Why had it not dawned on us sooner that we were diving head first into Latin America's most well known wine glass? First thing on our 'to do list' was to head for the vineyard of international brand 'Concha y Toro'. The location was very handy from the city of Santiago, being just a short taxi ride away from the last underground metro stop. Nowadays this historic 'viña' is more the commercial head quarters of the company, sited in the old grounds of the original. The buildings and gardens date from the 1820's, and are very picturesque. The experience was informative, if only to realise what huge outfits the winemakers of Chile have become, the sales pitch video at the start of the tour further enhanced the commerciality of it all. But you know, I'm not grumbling, we got to taste three very nice bottles. Unfortunately not the whole bottle though.
One of the wines we quaffed is known at home, called 'Casillero del Diablo', which comes in a variety of 'flavours' (okay, so I don't know the lingo yet....) or grapes.
Santiago is a pretty pleasing city, with a back drop of the Andes. Beautiful. If you could see them. The city suffers from smog, and the protected mountain ranges surrounding it are barely visible most of the time, even when we took the daft funicular to the top of Cerro San Cristóbal, one of the many hills that pop from nowhere from the flat cityscape. At the top of the Cerro is 14m high statue of the Virgen Mary, a small chapel, and piped choral music. A little surreal.
The hostal we stayed at was another dorm bunk experience, but this time sharing with 5 others. The breakfast was a DIY affair of yogurt, wholemeal bread, fruit, juice, tea/coffee. I mention this because breakfast is of such insignificance to latin americans that the offering to hungry travellers is often pretty meagre. We had a couple of great evenings chatting to folk from Sweden, Austria, Germany, and an Italian who had been living in Archway just up the road from Holloway. The down point was that Charles, the American owner, and his hobo helpers from the US and Canada (people work in hostels in exchange for board while travelling) didn't really understand the concept of cleanliness....the kitchen floor wouldn't even know what a mop was. The sheets were clean though and the intermittent showers sufficient!
Hannah
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