Greetings family and friends!
Well, I’ve learned a lot of things since arriving to Chile, but probably the most important lesson I’ve learned for maintaining a sane mind, is be ready to just go with the flow. And if you can, have a plan B. This especially applies to those trying to make attempts to cross the Andes in the winter. I’m heading to Mendoza next Sunday, so everyone keep your fingers crossed that the pass will be open!
So, it has been exactly three weeks since we left Max’s Curanipe house, but it feels like soo much longer! Fitting in all kinds of mini adventures and seeing all new places for me is what’s creating this sensation. It just seems like it’s been a lot longer than three weeks. Unfortunately I didn’t get any pictures on the drive up to Vina del Mar from Curanipe, but it was gorgeous although cloudy the entire way. We took the coastal road all the way up to Pichilemu, then it was inner highway to Valparaiso and Vina del Mar. We passed some precious little coastal pueblos after Constitution (the farthest north I had been before this drive was Constitution). These pueblos were hit hard by the 2010 tsunami because they all sit literally between the beach and a massive hill, so the wave just smashed everything against this hill. On the other hand though, the hill gave the people an immediate close place to seek higher ground.
After passing all these little towns the next section of the drive was an impressive 23ish km stretch of massive sand dunes between the ocean and the road. Then we went a little inland and passed by Lo Valdivia, which is the ruta de sal, where sea salt is harvested using an ancient method where tons of shallow square pools are made every year by creating little dirt/clay walls, then tides come in and flood these pools, then in the summer the water can’t escape when the tide recedes, but rather it evaporates and all the salt left behind is harvested. (please look up pictures!) I guess there are only a handfull of locations in the world where this method is still practiced. Max picked up various bags of salt for friends, and it is ridiculously, sadly cheap.
We got dinner that night in Pichilemu, which is a fairly famous surf town in Chile, but not Max’s favorite spot. And it has become too touristy for his liking, although one of his favorite seafood restaurants in Chile is located there. It was a Monday night and the restaurant was deserted, which was great because the owners weren’t busy and we basically got to hang out with them and have a nice leisurely dinner/rest before tackling the final leg of the drive. It was amazing to arrive to Valparaiso/Vina del Mar at night, because the cities’ lights on the hills and in the port/bay look so magical! It was quite breathtaking once we crested the final hill of the highway to commence our decent into the cities and have the bay all lit up in front of us.
Max had various things to take care of in the next couple days before we went to Santiago to meet up with his friend Randy, but he also fit time in to continue being Chile tour guide extraordinaire, and he drove me all over Vina del Mar and Valparaiso. Then we spent two nights in Santiago with a friend of his before heading up to Portillo with Randy. And I will mention now that the 3 week adventure I spoke of in the previous journal entry did not happen after all, for various reasons. Firstly, Randy was having some health issues, and decided it would be for the better to cut his vacation short. Also, the Andes/Chilean central coast got hit with a mondo storm which brought lots of (awesome) snow to the border, making crossing impossible. Part of our plan was to go to Mendoza, convenient for me because I was needing to renew my 90-day visa (done by crossing the border), but since this wasn’t going to happen after all and we new this big snow storm was coming, Max was amazing and gracious enough to drive me across the border during our only 24 hour window of decent weather between Monday and Tuesday. Monday night we stayed in this lovely little Argentinian town called Uspallata. The drive across the Andes was spectacular!
So we decided to leave Portillo Thursday morning to pass the storm in Vina del Mar. Randy left Wednesday night to go back to Santiago before his flight left the following Monday. We were hoping to pass some time with him that weekend in the Casablanca Valley (major Chilean wine country near here), but the rain never really stopped from Thursday through Monday. There was a break in the rain Saturday morning, so we took a short walk to where we could check out the coast, and the waves were huge and gnarly. I think basically a near-hurricane passed through the coast; central Chile received an immense amount of rain in a short period of time, with heavy winds, and lots of coastal restaurants/shops/etc suffered wind and wave damage. The weather dominated the news for about three days; lots of washed out cars and roads, mudslides, flooding, but also kind of inspirational in that one story was about a river bed that was filling with water for the first time in years. So Max and I stayed cooped up in his house during the storm watching movies and cooking. Which guaranteed we were well rested for the following week in Portillo! Haha.
We left Monday afternoon and took the coastal drive up to Papudo (again gracious Max trying to give me every possible opportunity to see more of beautiful Chile), and stayed with a friend of his in Cachagua that night. Tuesday morning we then drove back up to Portillo! I had a ski lesson Wednesday morning and we skied through Friday afternoon. The snow was amazing there, and the weather got better every day; on Friday there wasn’t a cloud in the sky and the mountains shown brilliantly in the sunlight. The lady I had my lesson with is a living legend in Portillo, named Heidi. She has been an instructor there since the 60’s, and she also instructs yoga every evening in the gym. We left late Friday night so that we could attend a party for a good family friend of Max’s. Yesterday Max drove us to Santiago (actually, a barrio outside of Santiago called Lo Barnechea), where we had lunch at la Hosteria Dona Tina, one of the most famous restaurants in Chile. Dona Agustina is the owner, and her story is just incredible (worth your time to look up). I read her book while staying at Max’s beach house in Curanipe, so to finally go to her restaurant and not only taste her incredible food, but actually meet her too was an experience I’ll never forget. We took “the long way” back to Vina by taking the Cuesta de Duerma (I think that is the correct name), which was the old route from Santiago to the Valparaiso Port before the major highways were built. A good friend of Max’s has a goat farm in Olmue, which is a pueblo located along this Cuesta/route, so we stopped there fast to pick up some artisan goat cheese and dulce de leche (however, in Chile it is called manjar) - but, this is special dulce de leche/manjar because it is made from goat milk instead of cow milk. Today we are relaxing before heading back up to Portillo again tomorrow morning. It is nice to not be sitting in a car for hours at a time… We will spend a couple nights again in Portillo, come back here and spend my last couple days here in Vina before I head to Mendoza on Sunday. So hard to believe my time in Chile is coming to a close! (for now)
Not sure if I mentioned it, but I am taking a two week language immersion course in Mendoza before heading to a farm in Cordoba for a couple months. Next time you hear from me, it will be from the other side of the Andes!!
