A Lucky Escape
Trip Start
Sep 06, 2005
1
28
41
Trip End
Jan 08, 2006
Valparaiso/Viña del Mar, Chile
Thursday, November 24, 2005
The traveller`s bible (Lonely Planet) describes Valparaiso as charming for two reasons - the macho rough and tumble grey and dirty port (granted - it is rough and grey) and the feminine rolling hills, grandiose mansions and poetic alleys (?!). According to Sharky`s Planet it`s a hole! Yep - worse even than Portsmouth (that as a girl from Southampton although I have to admit it isn`t so bad these days..). Yes there are hills and brightly painted houses and alleys but they are dirty and smelly and rough! The Lonely Planet does contradict itself later on saying that there are packs of dogs, thieves (a police lady warned us in one area to keep an eye on our rucksack) and that women shouldn`t walk around alone so I think a schizophrenic wrote it! It`s also a UNESCO world heritage site here (one of the reasons we came, expecting a Chilean Ouro Preto) but seemingly only for the (now very run down) acensores - sort of wooden boxes that you sit inside on benches and they go up the steep hillside on rails via a pulley system. If that`s all that you need to get world heritage status then things are looking good for Ealing and Neaseden.
We´ve made the best of things - visiting all the cultural spots you`re meant to visit and diligently plodding the streets and ticking things off. We went to a really yummy, good value restaurant for my birthday lunch for three filling courses and plenty of Escudo beer. Valparaiso is by the sea which is nice and the weather (until this morning) has been warm and sunny. Things on the accommodation front have been a bit bizarre. Teresa met us from the bus station and we lodged for the first night at her appartment close to the National Congress building (which is here rather than Santiago - there are elections on December the 10th and a lady is running for the first time in Chilean history). We had a bright airy room with a TV (happy Neil with lots of film channels) and 5 beds (!). The strangest thing was that the appartment was peculiarly partitioned (perhaps from when Teresa had her 6 kids at home) so that we didn`t really have a ceiling for part of our room, only a false wall that didn`t reach the top - good for privacy! Long story short I had to break it to Teresa the next day that I couldn`t possibly stay there any longer as I found it hard to sleep (understatement) with the sound of mice/rats gnawing in the walls. She didn`t deny that they existed (thanks for warning us) but explained that her appartment was very clean and it was the fault of the neighbours above...
She kindly helped us find another place to stay through a friend of hers. It`s even stranger (but no rats)! We are now in room 409 of the Nautilus Building (maybe 20 floors high). We have a slightly stinky bed sit (bed, lounge area, kitchen area and bathroom) with a sea view (over the multi story car park). The crazy thing is that I think we might be the only residential room in the whole building - the others are all offices with secretaries sitting in the outer part of a partitioned off room, some of them using typewriters! I think we have some sort of doctors next to us and an insurance company opposite - weird. Still, I slept the best last night for days (with some assistance from a litre of Gato Negro, the cheap boxed Chilean wine).
This morning it rained so hard that it was the top news story on TV. Apparently the traffic lights are all set to summer shininess so no one can see them in the rain... However, it was gorgeous sunshine again after lunch so we hopped on the metro train thingy to Viña del Mar, the beachy area up the coast. The train was free (hurrah) as we found out later that it was its opening day (handy). We also met an older couple from Farnborough, Hampshire on it - not far up the M3 from Southampton and Portsmouth - but thankfully managed to give them the slip after they looked like they were becoming quite attached. Viña del Mar turned out to be lovely (I am now cursing the German on our salt plain tour who said that he would choose Valparaiso to visit out of the two towns?!?) - not too bad beaches, palm trees and beach side boulevards plus a really lovely landscaped and lush park. We were adopted by a very healthy looking and happy street dog for a couple of hours (we named him Hobo - cute photos later) during our strolling around and the 3 of us narrowly missed being squished by a bus that suddenly hit a car and mounted the pavement. 3 seconds earlier and it could have been different - phew!
Tomorrow we head off to Santiago for our final 4 days in South America before our flight to New Zealand (and rat free accom - I hope) on Sunday.
