Santiago, Chile--The Start of an Amazing Trip to Easter Island and Patagonia

Last winter, friend Nava invited me to join her and others on a trip with OAT (Overseas Adventure Travel) to Easter Island and Patagonia.  Patagonia excited me, especially after traveling to Alaska.  I was less interested in the pre-trip to Easter Island, but after going there, I was delighted that I had the opportunity to do so.  We were to also go with friends Haia and Jimmy from Seattle, Les from Texas, and Havazelet from Israel.  Sadly, less than a day before she was to head to the US, Havazelet had an accident before she was to fly to Seattle and could not accompany us.  She was with us in our thoughts every day of the trip, and this blog is dedicated to her.

So, on October 13, Nava and I boarded a plane to Santiago, Chile, the starting point of our adventure.  After a 4 hour flight to Atlanta and then a 9-hr red-eye flight to Chile where I managed to sleep 4 hours, we were tired but excited to begin our journey.  A driver from OAT met us and drove us to the Hotel Torremayor, where we met our leader for the whole trip, Lucelia, or "Lu" for short.

Santiago is in a flat plain with the snow-capped Andes to the East and the Coastal Mountain Range to the west.

Picture from Wikipedia article on Chile

 Santiago, the capital of Chile, is 4 hours ahead of Seattle.  Chile has over 17,000,000 people with 5,000,000 living in the capital.  The city is large, somewhat circular in shape, and about 25 miles in diameter.   It was founded in 1541 but almost no colonial buildings are standing due to the earthquakes, given the city's location on the Pacific Ring of Fire.  Our guide told us that Chile has more natural disasters than any other country on earth!  Strict building codes has greatly lessened damage in recent years, including during the 8.8 earthquake in 2010.

 We joined 10 others for the pre-trip (from California,  Arizona, the DC area, NY, VA, and Texas)  and 3 more will join us for the Patagonian trip.

We headed out first to get Chilean pesos, either at an ATM or an an money changer.  The exchange rate was 677 pesos to one US dollar and today it is at 688.  

 Bills are the same size but different colors.  The bill below was worth about $7.40 when we were there.  The money was quite pretty.

Then we  took the Metro to get to the old part of Santiago in the central area.  It is the second largest subway system in Latin America, after that of Mexico, and quite modern.  It has 5 lines and covers more than 64 miles.   It is the main form of transportation in Santiago. It runs from 5:30 a.m. to 11 p.m. Citizens want it to run at least midnight but the government says that it costs to much to do so. Tickets cost about $1 per ride. Part of the Metro has art work on the walls.  We saw murals, paintings of native peoples, and metal sculptures.

An example of art on the subway walls--see the train below

 Our city guide Miriam told us that musicians often perform, and so do actors and there are free movies in the theater in the metro area.  Miriam told us to quickly get on the subway as we had 18 seconds to get aboard from the time the doors open until they close, so we hastened to comply!   We transferred smoothly to a second train and got off at the Plaza de Armas, the central plaza in the city.   . 

We had lunch near the plaza at the Bar Restaurant Nuria, not your typical tourist place.  Lunches were about $6-7.  Bottled water was extra and they don’t serve tap water though it is perfectly fine to drink.  Several people got Pastel de Choclo, a pie with ground beef and chicken on the bottom, then with egg and olives topped with a corn bread sweetened a bit.  It was very filling.

  Haia and I got Sopa de Ave, chicken soup with squash, potato, rice 1/4 chicken and vegetables.

menu picture of food choices

Miriam showed us a great laminated map of Chile, showing that of the 17,000,000 people in the country, 7,000,000 live in Santiago.  The northern third of Chile is the Atacama dessert, which is mostly uninhabitable but has beautiful areas to visit. The southern third is Patagonia with mountains and colder weather so is not suitable for agriculture.  Most  of the people live in the center and that is also the "breadbasket of Chile," where most of the farming takes place.  Chile is very strict about foodstuffs brought into the country, and plants, seeds, dairy products and meat are not allowed.  Bags are strictly checked at the airport.  From Santiago west it is a one hour drive to the Pacific Ocean beach, and 1.5 hr east to the mountains and skiing.   

Miriam gave us a quick history of the country from Santiago’s  founding by Pedro de Valdivia in 1541. Chile's  main export is copper but it has fallen from $5 a lb to $2.60,  and it costs $2.5 to produce.  Chile is also the 2^nd largest exporter of fresh fruit in the world. Tourism, is the 5^th largest industry, and is just taking off now.

 The main plaza includes the History Museum, Post office, and Cathedral.  The latter was rebuilt 3 times, the last time/in the 19^th century, after fires, shoddy construction, and earthquakes had destroyed it.

Part of the Plaza, colonial buildings with modern in background

We were there on the coldest day of the week with temperatures huddling in the high 40s.

The palms with the chubbier trunks were indigenous to the area.

Mounted Police in the Plaza

 The Cathedral had a lot of paintings inside but no gold as in plaza churches in the Andean countries.

Stained Glass Windows in Cathedral

There was a stature in honor of the native peoples in the plaza.

 70% of the citizens are nominally Catholic, 18% Evangelistic, etc. About 5% of the population are indigenous peoples. The largest group is the Mapuche.  To read more about the indigenous peoples, go to http://indigenousnews.org/indigenous-peoples/chile/

We saw many stray dogs in the center of town, just a fraction of over 3 million in Santiago.  They are not dangerous but it was sad to see so many.

A stray dog in front of a bank by the stock exchange

We then walked part way down a street closed to cars which continued for 7 blocks.  We walked to the Stock Market and the buildings with the local government offices and a statue nearby of Allende, the socialist president who was overthrown by the military (with the backing of the US)  headed by Pinochet in 1973.   Horrific human rights violations took place during military rule, which lasted until 1990.

Statue of Allende

There are a number of taller buildings in the more modern part of town including the 64-story Gran Torre Santiago,  which is the tallest building in Latin America.  You can see how stormy it was the day we were in town.

Bike Rentals

To my disappointment we didn’t have time to go to the Museum of Pre-Colombian Art.  Together with the one in Bogota, it is one of the top two in Latin America.  You can read about it at the website:   http://www.precolombino.cl/en/

We took the metro back, got some snacks at the supermarket, and then tried to help Les get new hiking shoes. After showering at the hotel, we  all met at 6, had Pisco sours (the national drink of Chile as well as Peru),  introduced ourselves, and then walked a few blocks to a tall building with a revolving restaurant (the Giratorio) on the 7^th floor where we had dinner, including champagne, cheese or beef empanadas, steak or a delicious white fish called Hake (an oily member of the cod family), and a papaya dish for dessert.  I only had half of the Pisco sour but it made me dizzy.

 We were  awakened at 5:30 the next morning, to catch a 9 a.m. flight to Easter Island, where our adventure would really begin!  As we drove to the airport, we saw a pretty sunrise and mountain tops above the morning smog/fog.