Valparaíso

Looking at things from a new angle

We went to Valparaiso which is a coastal town 1½  hrs away from Santiago. The hostel we were in was at the top of a small hill and we got there fine. The inside of it was amazing. The living room had a ceiling that was about 15 meters high! The whole building had a very industrial look to it. But the funny thing was that there were a trapeze bar and a silk rope hanging from the ceiling in the middle of the living room … in case you needed circus practice I’m guessing!

The most amazing thing was that sitting at the dinner table quietly having tea were Giuseppe and Stephanie who we had met in Arequipa, Peru almost two months before. It is indeed a small backpackers world.

 



Enjoying a drink and the view in a café 



An example of Street Art

Valparaiso is the town where the Chilean congress meets today and it lies on the equivalent of the Chilean “Côte d’Azur”. The who’s who of Chile usually owns a beach house outside Valparaiso, usually in Viña del Mar.

The particularity of Valparaiso is that it had hundreds of wall paintings and most of the houses lining the steep streets (the town is built along and in between a number of hills) are painted in vivid colours. We walked along many of the streets snapping away at the beautiful paintings.

That makes for funny streets

Neruda's ship

We also visited another house of Pablo Neruda here. This one too was a beauty. Sitting on the top of a hill, overlooking the harbour and delightfully decorated, it is a masterpiece. From there we walked all the way back down to the city Centre where we had a great ice cream at Emporio La Rosa, probably the best we’ve had so far : Roxana chose Raspberry-Mint and Ginger-Orange and I went for Chocolate-Orange and Mango-Green Tea.  

The following day we took a collectivo (tip-top) to go to Concón. I’m not kidding, that’s the name of this town 30km north of Valparaiso. We went there for only one reason : to try out a fish restaurant that was highly recommended to us by Francisca, our guide in the Free Walking Tour in Santiago.



That`s a nice surprise!



Ceramic mosaics



They're waiting for leftovers from the catch of the day 

The collectivo left us on the far side of Concón and we had to walk 45 minutes along the sea front to reach the restaurant called “La Gatita” (The Kitten). When we got there at 12.30 there were no tables available and we were asked to wait. They only had about 30 people eating at any one time and outside were about 12 chairs for people to wait. They were definitely a very popular restaurant.

The view is spectacular even if the clouds loom

While we were waiting the queue got bigger and bigger with hordes of hungry, soon to be customers : from friends on their day off to the colleagues on their lunch breaks and businessmen entertaining customers. After about 20 minutes they called out our names and we went in. We had a wonderful sea food platter with all kinds of goodies from the sea. It was so big that we shared between the two of us.

On our way back, the driver of the collectivo who had heard us talking started conversing with us in French!!! That was unexpected but it turns out he worked for 18 years in Switzerland as a truck driver. Anyway he gave us a good tip to walk from one end of the main shopping street in Viña del Mar to the other to catch another bus back home.

We enjoyed Valparaiso very much but had to make our way back to Santiago. 

For more pictures : Valparaiso