Central Chile is only about 200km wide. While Santiago is in the foothills of the Andes, a short two hour drive finds you on the shores of the South Pacific at Valparaiso and nearby Vina del Mar. Not exactly the calm beaches of the Pacific islands: instead large waves crash into the large sea walls sending spray 20m in the air and signs provide tsunami evacuation routes. Nonetheless, Chileans and Argentinians flock to the beaches nearby.
We took a bus from Santiago on a day trip to visit both of these lovely locations.
Vina del Mar
Vina del Mar is the most popular beach escape in Chile, but despite us being there in the height of summer we weren’t tempted to brave the fierce waves and icy waters. Instead we just had a bit of a wander around looking at galleries and whatever else caught our fancy.
After arriving in Valparaiso on the bus from Santiago, we checked Google Maps for the nearest bus stop going to Vina del Mar , walked about three blocks to the main street and flagged one down. Always useful to keep small Chilean pesos in your wallet, because things like this are going to be cash only, and super cheap. It was a few hundred pesos for all four of us to catch the bus.
Once we arrived in Vina del Mar, clearly the first thing we needed to do (aside from the Ralph Macchio pose above) was take a picture of the famous flower clock. It was built for the 1962 World Cup held here, and still appears to be working, although it was gonging at random times while we were standing there.
Museo Palacio Vergara
After walking down to the water for Jas’ best Ralph Macchio impression, we wandered over to the main city park and discovered the Museo Palacio Vergara. It is one of the many grand houses that has been converted into a gallery. An eclectic mix of some old, but mostly contemporary art, with several temporary exhibitions including one all around the theme of pigs. There was some really interesting art in there, actually.
…of which, inexplicably, we didn’t take any pictures of. Anyhoo, here’s a picture taken not at the museum, but nearby, of a statue presumably purloined from Rapanui (Easter Island), back when that sort of thing was OK. We’re not going to Rapanui, so this worked well for us.
Donde Feathers
Since we arrived in Chile we’ve been curious about the many restaurants with ‘Donde’ in their name. Donde Juan, Donde Pablo, Donde Fidel etc, which in our basic Spanish would translate to ‘Where’s Juan’. Jas had found us one such place in Vina del Mar for lunch, called Donde Willy. This time we asked the ebbulent owner and chef, Willy, what it all means. Together we came to the conclusion that it means something like ‘Chez Willy’. There’s no really good translation into English other than a boring apostrophe – ‘Willy’s’. Our meal here was one of our first dalliances in the Chilean (and Latin American) love of long, multi-course lunches. Two and a half hours later we rolled out of here satisfied and suitably relaxed.
(Again, no actual pictures of Willy or the meal. But trust us, Willy was a great host)
Valparaiso
‘If we walked up and down all the stairs of Valparaiso we’ll have walked all round the world.’ – Pablo Neruda, Chile’s lauded poet laureate
After a couple of hours in Vina del Mar, we made our way back to Valparaiso. And in the intense summer heat, after a few hours of walking around town we figured out what Neruda meant by that quote. And we’d only climbed two of the 42 hills.
Tourist websites about Valparaiso wax lyrical about ‘ascensores’, small funicular lifts which will whisk you up the steep streets to wonderful views of the colourful houses adorning the hillsides and the beautiful street art. Despite our best efforts we failed to find any of said funiculars, with the only exception being the one that we circled around and around for about an hour, Google Maps being utterly useless here, until we eventually found the entrance – oh wait, that’s the exit… we’d found the top of it. So in the end we had to rely on hauling ourselves around town under our own steam, and only managed to find some of the street art.
At the top of the first uphill slog we did manage to find one of Nobel poet Laureate Pablo Neruda’s houses, La Sebastiana, where the whole port city is laid out below you from the floor-to-ceiling windows.
The house itself has the same feel as the collection inside, like it’s been put together by a blindfolded guy wandering through an antique store picking things up at random. Spread over four levels all of different shapes and sizes, it’s a little reminiscent of Gaudi and does resemble a boat.
Neruda collected all kinds of weird and wonderful artefacts, like a clock that was also a painting with various people whose arms and legs moved with the chiming of the hour; a carousel horse placed on a curved wall so that it looks like it is still on the carousel, and all manner of other things.
In hindsight a walking tour may have been a better idea but then we would have had to cut short our long lunch, and that’s not really in the spirit of embracing the local ways. Plus, we’re in training for Mendoza next week where more wine tasting awaits.
In our next installment, we will be taking a bus from Santiago across the Andes and through the famed ’29 curves’ on our way to Argentina and Mendoza!
Valparaiso In a Nutshell
Although you could rent a car to get to Valparaiso from Santiago, we opted to take a bus. They’re cheap and run often. Use https://www.busbud.com to book your ticket.
Once in Valparaiso it’s easy to flag down a local bus going to Vina del Mar. They will list it on the sign above the windshield. The fare is cash only, and is around 150 pesos per person.
Although we’d hoped to join a walking tour, we mis-timed it and missed out. We’d recommend you add this to your itinerary, because we felt like we didn’t see as much as we could have on a tour.
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