Chillin' in Chile

Hola Chicos,

Santiago de Chile was the next city to be graced with our presence. Our fellow nomads had not given Chile’s capital rave reviews. However, we arrived there ready to form our own opinions of this 5 million-strong settlement.

We began our sightseeing of Santiago in a park opposite our hostel. The first thing that struck us was the quantity of public displays of affection. Couples dotted around the park seemed to have no regard to the fact that they were in the middle of quite a busy thoroughfare. Some couples were getting extremely frisky. Not something we’d ever see in London. It was later explained to us that the extremely conservative views of Chilean parents meant that young lovers could not be left at home 'unsupervised' and therefore had to go elsewhere for greater intimacy. Our first day in Santiago seemed to pass us by without any sightseeing achieved. This is not normal for us; our default setting is to do as much in one day as possible. However, our disappointment was lightened greatly by watching Real Madrid get absolutely smashed by Borussia Dortmund. Justice for unfairly beating Manchester United?

Our second day was a great success. We decided to take a free walking tour of the city given by a man dressed like Wally from “Where’s Wally?” His name was Martin and the three hour tour flew by thanks to his wacky personality and charisma. Ten minutes into the tour we saw a sight that will stick with us as the everlasting image of Chile. In a park, strewn across 5 benches were Chilean workmen, dressed in their high-visibility jackets, fast asleep. It was 3.15 in the afternoon.

One of the main attractions we were taken to was a church of the Opus Dei. Our tour guide insisted that the Opus Dei was running the government of Chile.  It sounded like something out of The Da Vinci Code - we all love a good conspiracy theory.

We were also taken to a mural displaying the social issues in Chile as shown below.

Moving across from the left you can see the miners' qualms (remember 'Los 33'? - the Chilean miners trapped underground for 69 days who received global attention), the demand that education be accessible to all, the lack of identity of Chileans, over-fishing, and a big robot in the right-hand side destroying everything in its path. The robot is to symbolise the government.

We think we can sum up Chile’s problems in a much more succinct way.

Glorious nation of Chile have three main problems: graffiti, pollution and dog.

Every building we have seen in Chile has been defaced by graffiti. The pollution in Santiago is staggering. While we were there, the city was permanently enshrouded in a suffocating blanket of smog. A blanket the sun was powerless to penetrate. The problem with dogs is probably Chile’s largest. It is impossible to walk down the street without being followed by several stray dogs. Martin tried to convince us that they were only looking for a bit of love. Our fear of rabies overcame any desire to go anywhere near the dogs.

Martin was also keen to discuss Chile's recent political history. He gave us a whistle-stop tour, supporting his tale with the city's landmarks; the election of Salvador Allende in 1970 (the world's first democratically-elected socialist leader), his toppling in 1973 and subsequent 'suicide' (was he pushed or did he jump?), the rise of General Augusto Pinochet.

Another highlight of our tour was when the inimitable Martin pointed out what we thought was just a bog-standard café. Far from it - inside the blacked-out windows was a scene one would be more used to seeing in Amsterdam’s red-light district. Scantily clad women were waiting with a mug of coffee and some other offerings if you were so tempted. Apparently these coffee shops are a favourite hangout for businessmen in their lunch break. Bizarre.

It was a very enjoyable tour and saved us the time of getting lost in the city looking for all the main attractions ourselves.

We woke up the next day to a terrible stench coming from one of the inhabitants of our room. We should explain that when we encounter potently-pungent, dormant travellers, we dub them as “The Kraken”. We have no recollection of how or why we came up with this nick-name. But it has stuck. And, if anything, we are probably doing a disservice to these mythological Norse creatures. Sincere apologies.

We have encountered 3 so far on our travels. The first one was in Sao Paulo, wrapped up in his bedclothes like he had been mummified. The second Kraken appeared in Buenos Aires – he slept throughout the day and only arose at night to play games on his laptop, before scurrying back to bed at the Krack(en) of dawn. However, neither of these two came close to our new Kraken. The smell he was emitting was indescribable. We found the offending items – a pair of trainers. We then made the error of putting our nostrils to the contaminated items. Our nose hairs are yet to grow back. 

Tellingly we still had difficulty deciding whether we wanted to stay in the toxic environment of our room or venture out into the equally toxic smog of Santiago. However, as the Kraken rolled over in his sleep a fresh wave of mustard gas was released and the decision was made for us. We ventured out.

We decided it would be a good idea to scale San Cristobal, the biggest hill in Santiago which gives incredible views out over the city. Maybe 20 years ago before Chile discovered coal and how to burn things. Now it is difficult to see much further than 100 metres.

So, our overall verdict on Santiago? Well, after the adrenaline highs of Rio and the excitement that Buenos Aires had provided, Santiago might have appeared too bland. However, the hazards which existed in Rio and BA were far less conspicuous in Santiago; there was no crippling poverty, no sprawling favelas on the city's outskirts, no soaring inflation, fewer shady individuals. Therefore Santiago was a pleasant and very moderate city, after the excesses - both good and bad - of Rio and BA. Our 3 days in Santiago were enjoyable but more than enough.

We had been advised to visit a seaside town, two hours from Santiago,  called Valparaiso affectionately known as Valpo by the locals. We could not wait to fill our nasal passages with some pollution-free air.

Our first night in Valparaiso brought about an incident called “egg-gate”. We decided to stray from our classic dinner of pasta and tomato sauce and branched out into the world of...eggs. We rocked up to the till of the supermarket with some eggs, bread, ham and beer. You can all understand our shock when this meal came to an extortionate 13,000 pesos (6 pounds each). We could have eaten a 3-course meal with a free drink at a restaurant for this price!

As we enjoyed our free tour in Santiago so much, we resolved to do the sister tour in Valparaiso. We walked around Valpo for a total of three hours. The town has a distinctive feel to it, which we thoroughly enjoyed. One fact we picked up from our tour was that in Valparaiso 15 different fire stations, each linked to a different nationality. Valpo is a hotspot for fires, just the week before we arrived there had been a fire which had destroyed 120 houses.

Whereas the graffiti in Santiago had been more of an eyesore, in Valpo some of the graffiti was stunning and original. We were informed that in Valpo graffiti it is actively encouraged with some streets left to professional graffiti artists.

One item of graffiti that will stick with us is the words “Pollo al Velador” (see photo below, eng. trans. chicken on the bedside table). These words are code for those participating in illicit relationships. A couple in an office would say to each other "pollo al velador". Then in their lunch break they would lope off and purchase a roast chicken before going to a pay-by-the-hour motel. Once the deed was done they would eat they chicken. Filling and fulfilling.

There are 18 ascensors (eng. trans. elevators) scattered around the city to take people up the steep hills which characterise Valparaiso. However, in typical South American fashion, only 6 are functioning each day. We figured these were the lazy mans option as they are only 100 metres long and climb a relatively small height.

We headed out for a late supper with some Americans we had met on the tour and others staying in the hostel. We consider this night a great success as we stumbled upon a quality dish called choriallonos. It consists of tasty meat, cheesy sauce and some hot sauce, all served on a bed of chips. Outstanding. Our American friends did not get much of a look in and we ended up consuming nearly all the platters ourselves. A highlight of the evening was a joint karaoke performance from us. There were some questions as to why we had not been signed by a record label. 

We crawled (25 hour journey) to San Pedro de Atacama in the late evening the next day, keen to see a bit of the Atacama desert. We were not disappointed...