Vina del Mar

 

The name means vineyard by the sea and it is just around the bay from Valparaiso.  It was our last stop before heading to the airport and the flight home. While Valparaiso has a great deep water port, it lacks a good beach where you can swim and sun bathe.

 

Vina del Mar makes up for that with great beaches

rocky inlets with tide pools

and strong currents that can be used to sweep any unwanted family members out to sea.

While it lacks Valparaiso’s character, it does have a casino, spas, beautiful people and a great museum of Easter Island artifacts.

It was with sadness that we headed to the airport to head home, greater sadness during the 21 cramped hours it took to get home, but even greater happiness at being home with family and friends.

Valparaiso

 

Valparaiso is a port town that has been designated as a World Heritage site because of its architecture. If you look at the picture below you can see the main harbor area has great 18th century architecture, but the real gems are on the hill side you see in the background.

They can be reached by takings the “new” funicular, it was built in 1904, up to the top.  The sign to it is rather unnerving stating that it was built in 1904 and maintained in 1904. Valparaiso has 15 funiculars, but only three of them are operating.

In 1994 they were designated as “one of the top 100 most endangered historic sites in the world.” It still beats walking up all of those stairs to get to the top.  Once there you are in the old section.

It is an area in transition. Like Cominito, it is where the ship workers and immigrants lived.

The architecture consists of houses built with galvanized steel painted in bright colors.

Before the Panama canal opened, Valparaiso was one of the main shipping ports on the west coast of the Americas.  Everything going around the horn stopped for provisions and pleasure. The galvanized steel was used as ballast on the ships and could be acquired cheaply or at no cost, since no one would carry those heavy sheets in the heat of the day, and a considerate person would never take a gentleman away from his evening dinner just to inquire if he might have a few of those old useless sheets of steel lying around the ship yard. The bright colors were marine main that had also been scavenged. It does make for colorful buildings, but I bet they were hot in the summer. In my experience air conditioning always trumps quaint.

I like the folk art that people paint on their walls and doorways.

But there are still parts of the old section to be seen. They seem to be more colorful in the light of day. Probably kind of scary at night.

and some times kind of brooding.

Many more pictures of Valparaiso

Pre Columbian Museum

 

It has a great museum of pre Columbian art. 

The Chilean Indians  had a very complicated view of time.  They believed that they are composed of parts of their ancestors this life was a preparation to be an ancestor.  They thought that the past, present and future all existed simultaneously.

The pottery work was great

And you’ve got to love gold work.

And one pottery that really looked like it was Chinese to me.

This statue was done in about 1200 AD.  There is a lot of people, not all crazy, who believe that the Chinese landed and settled in Peru between 200 and 500 AD.

Pre-Columbian Museum

Santiago

 

Santiago is a very cosmopolitan city, with just a few reminders that it was under a military dictator twenty five years ago.

The feeling on the military dictatorship is complicated.  Many people are still supporters of Pinochet.  Chile had the strongest economic growth it has ever had under Pinochet and many people feel that Allende was connected to the KGB. It does get very complicated with no easy answers.

Modern Santiago is filled with monuments to old liberators such as Simon Bolivar,

and young children who understand the purpose of these monuments.

I enjoy the plaza life and really like setting around watching people.

 

It is as they say, “a dogs life.”

More pictures of Santiago

Animals of Patagonia

 

We didn’t intend this trip as a photography safari, but in Patagonia the animals out number the people and seem quite satisfied with that arrangement.  They are very tolerant of tourists.  The first thing I wanted to see was guanacos.  Turns out they are quite numerous and I stopped taking pictures before photographing all 8000 in the park.

I was surprised to see flamingoes since I think of them as a tropical bird.  Fortunately they were not constrained by the limits of my imagination and were all over the park.

We also got to see both red and grey foxes

and some kind of duck whose name the guide told me, but I forgot as we got close to dinner.

The following picture is of a male and female of the same species.  The male is the black bird and the female is the white.  Again, I was told the name, but could not remember it across the dinner hour.  There is a lesson to be learned here.

And who could forget hiking in the Miledon Cave

 

to see a statue of the giant, but now extinct ground sloth.

 

Fortunately, the hike in the cave was on the only really rainy period we had on the trip. I have included a picture of the feet of a Alpaca just in case you thought you were in need of a pedicure.  These have to be the ugliest feet I have ever seen.

More animal pictures

Torres del Paine

 

When I told Molly we were going hiking in Torres del Paine, she asked, “Isn’t that Spanish for terror and pain?”. Paine is an Indian word meaning purple and the name translates as purple towers.

Patagonia is essentially at sea level and consists of what is called the Patagonian Steppes, which looks a lot like eastern Washington.

There are no trees though occasionally you will find a sheltered gully with some tall bushes.  The shelter is required because of the constant wind.

 

But it is beautiful for hiking in

 

and filled with streams, waterfalls

Lakes

and a hotel that gets my vote for the best located hotel in the world.

It is surrounded by mountains with interesting climbing possibilities

glaciers that come down to the lakes

and ice bergs that come down to your lunch spot.

We got to enjoy it in some of the best weather that they have had in a hundred years. And Molly had a great time hiking there.

 

More photos of Torres del Paine

Penguinos

 

We sailed all night through the Magellan Straights and arrived at Magdalena Island in the morning.

Magdalena Island is a rookery for the Magellianic Penguin.  There are one hundred sixty thousand on a small island that you can walk around in an hour. There are penguins everywhere

The penguins dig holes in the ground to nest.  You’ll walk by a hole and the dirt will be flying.

The penguins go about their business ignoring the people walking around

Doing what ever it is that penguins do.  It pretty much seemed like standing around was their main activity

With an occasional foray to the ocean

More penguin photos