Chile - the least Latin Latin country or life by the Andes

All by myself… after an emotional good-bye in Ushuaia with Diana I will be traveling by myself for a couple of weeks now before we will be reuniting again in early April. Another chapter in this trip is starting for me, more changes and getting used to different circumstances. Via Buenos Aires (where I spent a night at the EZE airport to catch my early morning connecting flight, can NOT recommend) I arrived in Santiago de Chile - so back to Chile after we had already explored Patagonia. Now more of Chile Centro and Norte, by taking this flight I had skipped over some of the volcano and lake area in Chiles South/Centre; choices, choices, tough choices ;) 

Honestly, after so much wildlife and nature neither did I feel like being in a big city again nor was I particularly interested in Santiago itself. But it wasn‘t the worst to have a few slow paced days to process the very active and fully packed January in Patagonia and Antartica as well as getting used to solo traveling.

Surrounded by the Andean mountains, Santiago is inviting the (first time) visitors to explore places with a view, so I checked out some miradors on hills and the impressive 300m high rise tower Sky Costanero with a 360° view. The city itself is massive and wide spread from a vintage point, but always the beautiful Andes in the back. I was looking for colonial and interesting architecture, but if you ever heard about earthquakes in Chile, you understand why there isn‘t much around... Chile is one of the countries with the biggest seismic activity in the world, and the last major earthquake that hit Santiago was in 2010 (8.8 Richter!! Fun fact: Apparently insurances in Chile don‘t even cover damages caused by earthquakes below 7 Richter). So the city had to be rebuild many times, for instance only one church remains partly original; the last significant rebuilding happened end of the 20th century and Santiago opted for pragmatic, not pretty, brutalist architecture. Nevertheless the city views did not disappoint, especially at sunset.

The first thing I noticed walking around the city were a lot of street sellers of all kinds, street musicians and homeless, many places like supermarkets having huge gates and locks at the doors. In a guided city tour I learned that Chile has been in a state of crisis since 2019 with riots and lootings, protesting the system of a continuous segregation of classes and widening of the social gap. The pandemic did not help obviously and with the economical impact for the country itself being marginal (one of the few countries in South America with a stable currency and strong focus on their economy), Chile is still an attractive country to move to for many  South Americans; (inofficial) UN population estimates say there is 24 Mio. people living in Chile today, at the time of the last census in 2017 it was 16 Mio., Chile is not able to sustain so many people and most of these are not doing particularly well unfortunately. Additionally, in Santiago I could see a clear split from East (rich neighbourhoods with new builds, also the big brands moved here from the center) to West (poor neighbourhoods with many living on the streets, though there is currently a gentrification happening in the West because the East gets too expensive). It doesn‘t make a lot of areas in Santiago the safest place to visit, crime numbers have risen and  there were reports of muggings and stabbings even in plain daylight; I felt safe for the most part though.

What I found interesting is that nobody here (openly) speaks about the dictatorship of Pinochet, to avoid either reminding someone of a personal/family loss or even worse talking to a (former) supporter of that system. After all in the referendum in 1988 about the continuation of the regime 44% of the population voted „yes“.

Escaping Santiago and the heatwave it was facing, I headed to the picturesque artsy town of Valparaiso by the sea where I stayed for four days to chill, do some yoga, think about my further itinerary, etc. Only two hours from Santiago and pretty all over with its colorful buildings molded in the hilly streets incl. several tiny funiculars, murals and street art everywhere and of course the access to the Pacific; although I must say that the beaches are better in neighbouring Viña del Mar and Concon. I visited one of the houses from Pablo Neruda, one of Chile‘s national treasures, the view from the bedroom is just breathtaking.

Here I tried some of Chiles local dishes, but neither the completo italiano (hot dog with toppings the colors of the Italian flag) nor other dishes were super convincing. I figured later that Chile wasn‘t particularly know for its cuisine, for whine and Pisco Sour though ;)

For a bit more country side flavor I went on a night bus to La Serena, 7.5h to the North of Valparaiso and closest city to conveniently access the Reserva Nacional Pengüina de Humboldt and Chañaral de Aceituno where Humboldt penguins, sea lions and whales delve in the waters brimming with nutrients. 

The nearby Pisco Elqui was an interesting day trip, the entire valley is known for growing grapes for the famous Pisco, but also the artisans and healing powers of cristals. The valley itself has a much different climate to all places nearby, it was blazing hot when I visited and almost unbearable to be in the sun. Also full with local tourists, as February is the summer holiday season for Chileneans; all tourist buses were busy with locals and while I thought this would be a good opportunity to improve my poor Spanish, I was mistaken :( Apparently the language here is more of Chilenean than Chilenean Spanish, at best it‘s Spanish were half the word is swallowed or complete words being left out or altered.

After another night bus, 15.5h this one, my time in Chile was well rounded off with a few days in the Atacama desert, the driest place in the world. Until the 1940-1950s an important area for phosphat (as a fertilizer) and sulfates (ie for gun powder), after the invention of artificial fertilizers its nowadays accounting for about 60% of the global lithium supply and has a significant share of global copper resources. Endemic wildlife species include vicuñas (a smaller version of the lama), donkeys, foxes, pumas and three types of Flamingos among so many other birds.

The Atacama landscape has been shaped by volcanic activity, glacial moraines and the micro climate between mountain ranges. Due to those mountains/volcanoes the area barely gets any precipitation, as the winds coming from the Amazon region usually rain down in Bolivia already; however, this year was one of the few were heavy rain has come down here as well and unfortunately some of the tours and activities weren‘t operating (ie sand boarding, access to geysers). 

I was still lucky to be able to discover some of this remarkable area: Despite Atacama being a desert, the landscape and vegetation change quite drastically and especially the so called Altiplanos (between 2.300-4.200m) amaze with salt lakes and flats, stunning lagoons, geysers and red stones all in front or amidst a snowcapped mountain range, offering a rather magical color palette. The climate also changes with altitude, while San Pedro at 2.500m has a very dry and stinging heat, the higher you reach winds get stronger, first make the heat more bearable until eventually it feels cold even. In addition, the thinner air needed my body to adapt - it was much more difficult to breathe and even walking slowly had me out of breath immediately, so I had to take breaks.

My next stop will be Bolivia and I’m planning to stay about two weeks, weather permitting. I‘ve met quite some people coming down South from Bolivia, where the rainy season has started by now. It could make travel more difficult, some places even inaccessible. But I will only know more once I‘m there and I am ready to flexibly alter my plans :)

Hasta luego, have a lovely weekend y‘all,

Seb