Valparaiso and Vina del Mar

                                       Valparaiso and Vina Del Mar

We took a bus from Santiago to the coastal town of Valparaiso.  We booked a room at the IBIS hotel that is right at the port, close to the cruise ship only to discover that the port building for check in is a few kilometers from there.  The view and room from the Ibis was nice and it is close to the historic centre of town, but I would rather have stayed closer to the Port building and walked to the centre of town, rather than trudging our luggage back and forth along the boardwalk .... note this if you take a cruise departing Valparaiso.

Valparaiso is charming, even if a bit run down.  It is structured like a large semi-circular amphitheatre with the main historic part of town at the bottom and then houses (sometimes shacks) lining the slopes.  There are several funiculars to get you to the top of the city, as well as stairs and steep roads.

Tucked away between buildings is another entrance for an "elevator" up the hill.

Though most of the structures were of concrete block, there were a fair number of wooden buildings with pretty details and sort of a beachy feel.

On the morning before embarking on the ship we took a neighbourhood walk up into the hills.  We encountered only 2 people, both of whom warned us to be careful of being robbed.  We definitely appeared like tourists and were not in the usual tourist spots, but Cassio and I always carry very little of value and only the bare necessities when out and about, so the risk is worth it to be able to see more.  I am not suggesting dark laneways at night, mind you....

Valparaiso market...some outdoors, some indoors.  Definitely not as clean as Santiago, but the town felt authentic and port-like, for sure.

One of the plazas near the port.

We hopped a local bus from Valparaiso to take us to the adjacent and much more renouned, Vina del Mar.  This town is a resort and beach destination for Chileans and others and boast pretty waterfronts, parks, nicer hotels, shopping, boulevards.... Oh, and they had roses, which I love!

We found it quite funny, however, to see people sunning on the beach fully clothed.  It should have been summery there, but in fact is was quite windy and a bit chilly.

Huts selling hippy style crafts line the boardwalk.

We got the wrong bus, or didn't get off at the right stop and ended up getting an extra bit of sightseeing as we went up into the hills where the people lived.  The driver ended up hailing another bus that was going back down the way we needed to go to return to Valparaiso and all in all, it was worth it, seeing the sandy, dusty and much more humble homes of the people who serve the rich and famous of the town.

South America Cuise

Patagonia and Tierra del Fuego

We took a two week cruise on Holland America's Zandaam ship departing Valparaiso and arriving in Buenos Aires.  Our first stop was a port trading town called Puerto Montt which is has a modern smallish city to the right of the port and an older market to the left.  We went left to see the shops (above and below) sporting wool, dried mussels on strings, a fish market and a pier where we saw seals swimming and eating fish!

Above is a man selling home made cheese from the back of his van on a downtown street.  

Soccer ball decoration in the port of Puerto Montt

Probably a lama for tourism purposes....to show the local colour?

Choose the size of fries just right for you!

 Our next stop was Chacabuco, population 1300.  Very small seaside town that really is home to a few industrial factories and not much else.  It was very quaint however.  We did not take any excursion into the nearby nature parks, which is the main attraction of this place.

We saw this shipwreck as we were sailing into port and found our way on foot to be able to see it up close.

This is it folks, Chacabuco.  Small, single story buildings, but most of the houses had pretty little gardens with flowers and plant life very similar to those of Toronto...probably due to a similar climate.

Despite being a small place, there were people from the town there to greet us with a sampling of food and pisco sours.  We did not wait to sample the lamb roast that they prepared at the foot of the dock with an outdoor wood fire.

The next few shots are just some of the many we took of the Chilean fiords, snowcapped mountains, ice floes, and overall breathtaking views.

Closeup above and us on the deck of the ship in front of El Brujo Glacier.  Photos simply do NOT do justice to the grandeur of a place like this. There is no sense of scale to truly reflect the magnitude of the glacier, nor can I convey the chill in the air or the crisp, fresh scent of the sea and ice. Rarely does Cassio tear up...this was one of those occasions.

A day or so later in our scenic cruising, we were set to view the shipwreck (below).  I was happy to have a good down jacket and vest and braved the sleet and driving freezing rain to get a "front row seat".  

Our next port of call was Punta Arenas.  I liked this town.  It is a good size with a noteworthy historical centre.  It is known for being a trading post and was established in 1848 as a penal colony.  There was a gold rush and a lot of sheep farming. 

Very old pier "home" to many cormorants.

Oddly "Q-tip" shaped trees line the avenues of the cemetery.

Sara Braun Menendez Cultural Centre.  Free to enter, you wear little booties on top of your shoes.  It is this wool baroness' residence.   Incidentally, Mrs. Braun Menendez was the wealthiest woman in the town and I believe it was the tourism guide on the ship who mentioned that she paid for the construction of the town cemetery, (shown above), and declared that hers would be the ONLY coffin ever, to go through the grand entry gates....all others needed to go in dead or alive, via the side entrance.

 The pictures only give an idea of how beautiful this was.

 Note the size of the ship (to the bottom left of the image) to get an inkling of the immensity of the glacier.

Ushuaia for a day!

 Who ever gets tired of seeing rocky snow capped peaks?

Ushuaia boasts that it is the end of the world and is often frequented by travelers who stock up at the many sporting goods stores before making the oceanic trek to Antarctica. We arrived in the middle of the day, which is when most shops close for "siesta" and so it was pretty dead.  Nonetheless, pretty to walk around.

It was a very exciting day when we rounded Cape Horn, but truth be told, I wish the seas had been rougher and given us a more memorable experience of the potential intensity of this rounding of the Horn.  What compensated for this, in my opinion, was that the library on the ship screened a film called "Around Cape Horn" which played on a loop the entire day which showed film footage from the 1929 of the ship Peking.  The film was shot by Irving Johnson when he was aboard and many years later, he narrated in a very animated way, describing the harrowing voyage.  It was a nail biter! I loved it!

This shot here is as close as we got to the Falkland Islands (known as the Malvinas by Argentina who still disputes it is part of her territory).  Due to high winds and unsafe conditions we were not able to spend the day here.  I heard from someone on the ship that it is common not to be able to get to the Falklands for this reason.  I was told by another passenger on the ship that Argentine citizens can't visit the Falklands much like what was the case of that of the States with Cuba. I researched this to discover that between 1982 and 1999 this was the case.  Nonetheless, the Argentine passengers, as well as the rest of us were a little disappointed, despite the fact that the place is practically a barren wasteland:)