Along Chile's Pacific Coast
Posted On Tuesday, February 5, 2013 at at 12:49 AM by Alvin
Arriving early on a blue blue morning, we found the Chilean capital, Santiago to be organised and functional and we soon went by Metro to our apartment in Monjitas in Centro - a rare luxury to overcome the jet-lag. We ventured out the following days to the open space of the Plaza de Armas and the nearby Paseo (pedestrianised streets) with lots of ourdoor cafes and ice cream parlours; we had a fishy lunch in the Mercado and we hiked up the gentle slopes of the Cerros Santa Lucia and San Cristobal to give our limbs some exercises after the 40 hours' flights. There were numerous big shopping malls in Santiago and we made good use of them as we found out that "mal-tiempo" had blocked the Andes Pass over to Mendoza as we sat contemplating our immediate plans in the comfort of these malls.
We decided to hit La Serena, a seaside city about 500 km north of Santiago and Chile's second-oldest city, to enjoy the Chilean Summer for a few days. La Serena had numerous beautiful colonial churches and the city's streets were easily navigated on foot and we had a superb Peruvian dinner (with ceviche !) at a rustic restaurant near the beach. We also ventured into the Elqui Valley to visit the cute and petite town of Vicuna (famed as the birth place of the Nobel Prize Winning Poet Gabriela Mistral). Along the Elqui Valley, we came by endless vineyards, which produced the famous Pisco brandy - still a bone of contention between Chile and Peru as to rightful owner of the Pisco brand. La Serena was just the place to be to get our travelling mind tuned up and whetted our appetite for this Latin American adventure !
