Chile: Valparaiso

Should I go ahead and finish posting about Chile now?  About time, right?

Our final full day in Chile was spent at the other activity that my father-in-law booked for us, and after the successful wine tasting trip, we were on board for another activity!

We had instructions to meet our guide at the top of one of the funiculars, one of the many vertical people movers in the city.  It was a great view from the top, overlooking a shipyard and the rest of the city, and we arrived early enough to enjoy the scenery.

It was a bright, sunny morning, and it was nice to walk along the pier with Gran.

 When our guide, Boris, showed up, he was smiles and fun from the start.  We booked through Chilean Cuisine, a class found through its high TripAdvisor ratings.  The cooking class had a few parts; we started at the house where we would eventually cook the meal, we rode together to a large fruit and vegetable market then rode to the fresh seafood market, then we took our goods back to the house, cooked and at our multi-course meal.  It was a perfect way to see how to cook an authentic Chilean meal from start to finish.

The first stop was the fruit market, which was in a sketchy area of town, so I didn't bring out my camera to capture the moment.  It was a sight to be seen, though, fruits and vegetables larger than I thought possible (again, everything grows wonderfully here).  They also had an unusual amount of cats in the market, which meant that we washed the produce really well before eating it.

The second stop was to the seafood market, which is where the fishermen come in from their daily catch and sell their finds to the public.  People can purchase the fish and take it to one of the many folks willing to filet it for a tip.  This man was the fastest fish filet-er I have ever witnessed.

 With all of these folks filleting and cleaning fish, there were also plenty of animals waiting to inherit the scraps.

The fish market was a surprise highlight for me, it was great to see the incredible variety of seafood, though the real bonus was seeing all of these great sea lions.

I don't even know what some of these items are, but they make a nice photo.

 The cooking class itself was a huge success, everything we made was delicious.  The downside of the class was that it was absolutely overcrowded.  We were all bumping into each other as we were cooking, and we were sitting shoulder to shoulder as we ate the meal.  In fairness, Boris, our guide, was great at directing and redirecting each moving piece in the class.

The food was delicious, and we have all been promised the recipes - though they have not yet been send out.  It was nice to see the food from purchase to plate, and each dish that we prepared was unique to anything I have cooked before.

It was a nice way to end a really great trip to Chile.  We would return to this area in a heartbeat - it was a great place to visit!

Chile: Casablanca Wine Tasting

We ventured out to the greater Valparaiso area during some of our days in Chile, we went on two different excursions arranged by Jon's dad.  Both of them were highlights of our time in Chile.

The first excursion we booked was a wine tasting tour of the Casablanca Valley.  We knew that we wanted to explore wine country, and Wine Tours Valparaiso was highly recommended on Trip Advisor, so we booked with them.  There are options to book one to four wine tours in a day, with our without a wine paring lunch included.  Considering that we had Gretchen in tow and that there was a non-drinker among us, we opted for the 2-winery tour without lunch. 

Michael picked us up right on time from the hotel in a spacious Hyundai H1 van AND he brought his own personal car seat for us to borrow.  This is the first and only time during our numerous travels in South America that anyone has thought to even suggest a car seat for the baby - and he brought his own from home voluntarily - we knew it was going to be a good day!

Michael was a wealth of information, an anthropologist from England who came to Chile 12 years ago for a research project, fell in love and has made a life for himself in the area.  As many of the supplanted souls we know have done, he has become a jack of all trades with all sorts of different side jobs, including wine tour guru.  His knowledge of the area is vast, from the history of the vineyards to the composition of the soil.  He chose the bodegas we toured, and rest assured, we were in ample hands.

We started at Casas del Bosque, a beautiful bodega with winemakers from New Zealand, Chile and the USA. Casas specializes in Chardonnay, Sauvignon Blanc, Pinot Noir coming from the Casablanca vineyards and the delicious Carmenére and Cabernet Sauvignon coming from their vineyards in the Maipu valley.  The greenery here is a testament to the fantastic weather in Chile, everything grows beautifully!

The wines were all outstanding, the Chardonnay especially, but the highlight for us at this vineyards was that they have an on-site playground!  Gretchen was understandably bored when the tasting started, so I took her outside to play on the swings and slide - what a great option!  Bravo, Casas del Bosque, for your family-friendly grounds!

Entryway fountain - check out those clouds!

A large group tasting set up for later in the day 

Our next stop was an organic vineyard called Emiliana, another picturesque valley location, but this time they have animals running all over the grounds.  Here is a little duck that wandered about:

 And here is Gretchen staring down one of their many chickens.  Chickens are known for eating almost anything - including all sorts of bugs and pests that pose potential damage to the vines.  Since the vineyard is organic, this is one of the more effective forms of insect control that does not involve pesticides.

The chicken's proved their garbage-disposal reputation by fighting to eat some tree bark that Gretchen threw for them.  She was in her glory with all of these animals running around at her feet. Mom and Dad were more nervous that their dead-black eyes held a look of mischief and that the day would end with a chicken bite (peck?  I'm not sure what it's called...).  Luckily, they all kept their distance and the tour continued without incident.

 Insects are not the only ones who want to sneak a taste of the delicious grapes.  We witnessed a few chickens take running jumps to grap some low hanging grapes, and our little fruit-eater was thrilled when the guide said that we could taste some off of the vine.  They were Sauvignon Blanc grapes, a bit under mature and therefore quite tart, but Gretchen didn't mind a bit. She ate about a thousand grapes.

Aside from the animals, including alpacas, sheep, horses and geese, the grounds have land designated space for each of the full time employees to have a parcel to plant whatever they would like to grow.  It especially great since everything grows like kudzu here.  

The tasting was also great, they give everyone an option of pairing the wines with either chocolate or cheese, both of which were well-pared and delicious.  Gretchen preferred the chocolate, hands down.

 The wines were fantastic, the grounds were beautiful, and we had a lovely day to top it all off.  If you are ever in the area, make the trip to the Casablanca Valley and drink some Carmenere - it's fantastic!

Chile: Viña del Mar

This year Gran and Poppa booked a fantastic South American cruise with their (and our) good friends Rich and Ellen Ritter.  Their fantastic vacation evolved into a great reason for us to visit Chile and spend a few days with the cruisers prior to their departure from Valparaiso.  Chile is like many South American countries in that it charges a "reciprocity fee" upon entrance to citizens of countries that charge Chileans.  This means for us that while American citizens do not need a visa for Chile, there is a payment line at the airport that you need to visit prior to immigration to pay the entrance fee (currently US$160 per person).  This fee is valid for the life of your passport, so if you plan to go to Chile more than once, make sure your passport doesn't expire anytime soon.

Viña del Mar looking toward Valparaiso

Valparaiso is similar to San Francisco in more ways than one - the hills and winding streets, the cold Pacific rocky shore and the port's history as a product as the gold rush, it feels like a streetcar should be turning around every corner.  Ten kilometers north of Valparaiso is a town called Viña del Mar, which is a beach getaway for the thick-skinned, the water is cold, but that doesn't seems to bother the thousands of Chileans we saw fill the beaches.

We flew into Santiago, and though it is said to be a beautiful city, we decided to go straight to the coast.  We stayed at the Sheraton Hotel in Viña del Mar, thanks to the great folks at TripAdvisor that convinced me it was the best hotel in the city.  It was a great choice, beautiful building, perfectly located, spacious rooms and the most comfortable hotel bed I've experienced.  We had a great view of one of the public beaches from the window of our hotel room, giving us a chance to see the shear number of people that come out to brave the water during the summer months (Dec - Feb).  Gretchen loved this view so much that her nightly bedtime routine included saying good night to the beach.

Gretchen standing on our room's balcony

The Sheraton is located right on the water, to the point that the pool area is surrounded by crashing waves.  This made the poolside particularly interesting for the sunbathers, who at times received a sudden splash of freezing cold water from a rogue wave.  Gretchen loved it!

Viña del Mar is a neat town in the middle of a recovery period.  You can see where there are lots of missed opportunities to add restaurants, build up the waterfront and increase the overall appeal of the area.  That being said, if the town continues to prosper, it has incredible potential.  

We had a nice time walking from the hotel down the coastline to the Hotel del Mar, a large hotel and casino that looks nice but has a constant stale odor inside due to the fact that the casino allows smoking.  We walked through the hotel before the casino was open for the day and the air was still thick with cigarettes, I can't imagine that they could contain the smoke to just the casino, so I would think twice about booking a room.  

My father-in-law booked a city tour for our group so that we could get to know the town a bit better - the highlight for me being the incredible views from high up in the hills.

Once we were away from the water, the temperature rose by at least 10 degrees.

Gretchen chose the next tourist activity, a horse carriage ride.  It was a great way to end our day touring, and she was all smiles the entire time.  This little angel loves spending time with her grandparents, particularly when there are horse rides involved!

Easter Island - More Than Just Some Heads!

We spent last week on the most remote, inhabited island in the world.  We took a trip to Easter Island, known as Isla de Pascua in Spanish speaking countries or Rapa Nui, as it is referred to locally.  They all refer to the same place, a teensy, tiny island off the coast of Chile.  Waaaayyyyyy off the coast. In fact, Easter Island is 2,300 miles west of South America - its closest neighbor - and the next closest piece of land is Tahiti which is 2.500 miles further west.  If you have Google Earth handy, search for the island - and then you'll have a good idea of how amazing it is that anyone ever found it.

Obviously this is a less amazing discovery now that we have satellites and aerial views, but there is strong evidence that suggests that people lived on the island as early as 400AD, and that is truly remarkable.

The island is full of mysteries, there is little left of the original culture, so many of these mysteries go unanswered.

The island received its western name from Jacob Roggeveen, a Dutch navigator that first spotted the island on Easter Sunday 1722.  At this point in history, the indigenous trees of the island were extinct, the island population had been decimated by overpopulation and deforestation.  Since then, trees have been planted and some of the statues that had been knocked over by time, water, weather, or people  have now been restored to their original posts.

We visited the island via Lima, Peru, which was a decently longer trip than the more traditional route through Santiago, Chile, but the flights got us to the island with only one day of travel instead of taking an additional night to get there.

The only airport in Easter Island was a 2 minute drive from our hotel, yet we never heard a plane on our trip.  We stayed at the Hanga Roa Hotel, in the town of Hanga Roa, and it was a beautiful location. Our room was spacious and comfortable, our porch opened to an ocean front view.

It was a great hotel, great location, with inconsistent service.  We had many small incidents that could have been handled better by the staff, and discussed them with the manager prior to leaving the hotel, but the facility itself was fantastic.

This trip was intended to be a go-at-your-own-pace vacation, so instead of having tours lined up we rented cars for a couple of days and then spent the rest of the time exploring the island on foot.  It was an amazing, once in a lifetime experience and it will take more than one post to cover it all.  Here are some previews to the rest of the vacation: