Author: Rach

Photos: Rach

Santiago, the serene city. Or so it seems to us. For a place so populated there is, in the midst of the workers on their lunch breaks, tourists traversing the streets, businessmen conducting walking meetings and propping up coffee bars, a wonderful peacefulness about this place. On arrival this feeling came almost instantaneously – you could say it was like love at first feeling!

In terms of demure and beauty there are many other towns and cities from our past two months of travelling in South America that you would reasonably argue have better curb appeal – the quaintness of Sucre, the prettiness of Arequipa, the charm of Cusco – but Santiago’s high rises have a sort of understated New York glamour; its central plazas, cathedrals and palaces bursting with majesty. It’s like there’s a pride here – the Chilean flag is everywhere, mixed with a bohemian culture of street art, crafts and great food that make it a brilliant city to visit, and we expect, to live. But we didn’t get off to the best start. Here’s how we spent our 60 or so hours in Santiago.

After our fairly restless overnight bus tourney from Mendoza, we disappointingly arrived into Santiago on time, at 5.15am. We were told we couldn’t check into our air bnb, despite some pleading with the owner, until 1.30pm. Bummer! So there was nothing for it than to wait it out in the bus stop for a while with all our bags until places started to open. At 8.30am after some decidedly terrible fast food (what food court only sells burgers and hot dogs for breakfast??) we decided to take a taxi to the Natural History Museum, in the hope they would have large bag storage and we could while away a few hours in there. We bundled into an Uber finally around 9.45am and for the first time in all of our 8 weeks in South America, we were told one of us should sit in the front (apparently Uber is not entirely permitted in Santiago – other taxi companies rally against it because of the competition it poses). Our driver was very eccentric and excitable, practising his English and trying to teach us Spanish. We’d much prefer him to have applied his energy to concentrating a bit more – as we were approaching the park where the national history museum is located, our driver suddenly realised he was going to miss the left turn. They drive on the right here, so he swerved left across the dual carriageway. Nothing was coming towards us, but it was just before 10am and before 10am the road is one way on BOTH sides. As he swerved left a car was coming close behind us on the left side. That car slammed on, tyres screeching almost deafeningly, and we grabbed hold of the door and braced ourselves for impact. His car slammed into the rear driver side of our taxi, and spun us onto the side of the road. As we said earlier, luckily Rach was alone in the back and on the far side (!) and Ged was in the front, so as the car stopped we were relieved that both of us, despite a potential bruise or so, were completely fine. The car however was not. Our thoughts turned to our treasured worldly goods, all in the boot of the car which was now nicely mashed on the left side. Luckily again, the boot popped open and we retrieved them without any visible signs of damage. A bit shaken, we chatted to some bystanders who had run over to check we were ok, and to the police man who turned up, and then when we were ready we resumed our modus operandi, backpacks on backs, and shuffled off to the museum, debriefing the crash in stop-motion in our minds. What a smashing way to start Santiago!!

(Just to reassure everyone again, we are totally fine. We would have gone to the hospital if we suspected anything was injured or broken, but even 24hrs on we don’t have a bruise to show for it. And we’re sure Mrs P reading this account will be grateful to our Lady of Medjugorje which she gave to us before we left and we’re carrying on us at all times!)

After handily crashing us directly outside our final destination, it was a short stroll through the park (impressive setting!) to the museum, which we thoroughly enjoyed and would recommend. Very well thought out with interesting displays and information on the diverse topography and animal life across Chile right down to its Antarctic regions! The location in the park is one of the most impressive settings for not only this, but several other museums dotted about. Great to put your feet up in a bit of afternoon sunshine with a ‘helado’ (ice cream).

We went from there, in a normal taxi this time, to our air bnb. It was certainly worth the wait. A really lovely studio apartment with a well equipped kitchen (finally a chance to make dippy eggs for breakast!) and, the icing on the cake, a rooftop pool. Due to our tight schedule though we decided to get straight out on the 3pm free walking tour to finally get acquainted with this city we had been in for hours and not seen! We were treated to a fantastic 3hr tour all across the city by actor Felipe, who our friends Stacey, Lynden and Dries had met when they were here.

He gave a very theatrical account of the sights and history of Chile through the lens of a Santiagian (is that right?) which was thoroughly entertaining. What we learned:

• All about the terrible 17 year dictatorship of 1973-1990, which began after a military coup during socialist President Salvador Agente’s term, in which the Presidential Palace of Chile was bombed by Chilean military. Once again, we learned nothing about SA history at school, so listened with intent and decided to visit the Museum of Memory & Human Rights the next day to understand more.

• Roughly a third (7 million) of Chile’s population lives in Santiago, which was founded in 1541 and recently celebrated 200 years of independence from Spanish rule. We heard about how the indigenous Mapuchi people in the south killed the Spanish commander, who was here looking for El Dorado, by feeding him, somewhat appropriately, liquid gold. Reputedly they then used his skull as a drinking cup for chicha!

• Much like other towns we have visited, the city was built on top of an old Inca settlement. It got its latest name of Santiago from the apostle – protector of the Spanish military

• Coffee with legs is served in Cafe Compiernos- these are cafes where businessman congregate a lunchtime for coffee served by women wearing really short skirts. We found one near the main Plaza (see Gerard pictured having his coffee – Rach tried to take a sneaky subtle photo for the blog!)

What’s more, some of these (we heard less and less these days, and mainly in the downtown) offer a ‘happy minute’ where the blinds will go down as the cafe ‘temporarily closes’ and the women strip for the coffee- drinking clientele for a minute or two! Crazy!

• The current president is one of the 10 richest men in Chile and has been president before. Seems several presidents here have taken advantage of the rule that you can’t have consecutive terms but you can skip and term and return to the seat of power. Also bonkers, but perhaps in the context of government corruption across SA this seems like small change…

• The first Chilean presidents lived in the white palace on the Plaza de Armas (plaza of weapons – where everyone used to gather in a state of emergency), which is now the most spectacular looking post office. What is now the presidential palace used to be the mint house.

• It’s cheaper in Santiago nowadays to live in the city and more expensive in the suburbs. Quite contradictory! Especially also when you consider that in the past, the closer you lived to the Plaza de Armas the more important you were in Santiagian society.

After the plaza and presidential palace we headed also took in the Constitution building (now a library) opera house, ‘New York street’ – so named as it was built in the image of Wall Street, the river and the more bohemian district of Bellavista, home to cheap beer, hip restaurants and homemade crafts.

We ate at Felipe’s recommendation on our second day in this district at the Ciudad Vieja sandwicheria, where Rach had an amazing lamb and goats cheese burger with aubergine and mint, and Gerard had ‘the drunk’ beef sandwich.

We laughed as the burger Rach had sounded like it had been so named by a Liverpudlian (see receipt pic!)

En route to this part of town we stopped in a lovely cafe-lined street, ordered 2 Pisco sours (there has been a long-debated argument about whether they were invented in Chile or Peru – Peruvians use egg-white while Chileans don’t so we wanted to taste the difference), and sipped them happily in the company of Leo the dog, who is painted in a mural on the street just opposite.

To our second day. Before amazing sandwiches we got out and about on our own in the city, firstly visiting the Museum of Memory & Human Rights we mentioned. This incredible museum was a very real and well-done but disturbing and sad experience, as it walked you through the events that unfolded under Pinochet’s dictatorship. I don’t feel like we can write eloquently here about the atrocities suffered by left-minded Chileans over 17 years. The statistics of prisoner disappearances and executions has been continually creeping up since this has been investigated, from 2,298 initially to 3,185, then another 30 more have recently been accounted for. People are still missing and bone fragments are still being recovered.

The museum had a really moving installation featuring the victims of political torture and imprisonments recollecting how they were tortured. 38,191 people (including 2000 children) are believed to have been imprisoned or tortured during Pinochet’s power, across 1,000 detention and torture chambers across Chile, many in residential places (music was played to mask the screams). There are now 200 memorial sites in Chile, which was beautifully laid out across a floor length map on Chile in the museum’s entrance hall. This is a place that warrants around 4hrs to fully experience, following the very good audio guide, and we certainly left with a better understanding of Chile’s recent history and began to put into context how this peace and serenity felt now in modern day Santiago is very very real after such a heartbreaking past.

We then wandered around some of the sights we passed on our walking tour again, and visited the beautiful cathedral.

When we got hungry Ged decided to try the infamous ‘Italian hot dog’ or ‘pancho’ – Frankfurt sausage, crushed avocado, fresh tomato and mayo. WEIRD. Rach handily stumbled across the ice cream parlour we had seen the day before, which Felipe had told us had been crowned one of the top 25 in the world (the sign outside backed his assertion up!) Rach didn’t waste any time heading in and picking one of their more unusual flavour combinations – strawberry and white wine!

Next we headed for San Cristobal Hill to go up the furnicular to where the Virgin Mary statue looks out over Chile. We had assumed it was another Christo, so certainly different to all the others we have seen throughout the rest of SA!

The cable car took us out across the city to some great views of the spreading skyscrapers encircled by imposing mountain ranges. Lovely.

We spent our third day (Friday 1 March) atop our little pool top oasis – floor 24 of our apartment building, equipped with 2 bright blue pools, loungers, day beds and fabulous views of the spread city and hazy mountains.

Let us tell you – there’s nothing chilly about this part of Chile! Total bliss and just what we needed after 8 weeks of being constantly on the move, and perfect just before our long haul flight to New Zealand. More adventure beckons and Rach in particular can hardly contain herself – next time on the blog!

Ciao for now South America!