Memories and hints of a travelling IT professional.
Wow. Simply wow. An Austrian couple went to Talca, Chile and bought some land to open a harbourage for travellers. Today there are different courtyards with small houses (named after famous places in South America) attached where you can stay. Every evening a bell calls all current inhabitants for a vegetarian dinner. A very special place that has been built like an ideal settlement and playground.
Around Santa Cruz, Chile you’ll find many, many wineries. The best option would be to travel from one to the other with a tourist group or by public transport. If you’re driving on your own you’ll have to limit. That is why I didn’t make a tour with a wine tasting at the Montes winery but rather enjoyed their great restaurant directly in the vineyard.
Visiting the Clos Apalta Winery near Santa Cruz, Chile was an adventure from the beginning on. My host at the hotel decided that my last name was much too complicated and registered me at the wineries I intended to visit simply as “Mr. Stefan“. Arriving at the Clos Apalta Winery I saw that the whole place was protected by high walls and fences and at the massive and closed gate a solid security officer was standing.
Continue reading ““No problem, we’ve got an agreement with the local police.””
The Museo Colchagua in Santa Cruz, Chile was one of the few museums I was able to visit during my tour from north to south. And it is a special one, not really going deep into topics but very wide. It starts with some archeological exhibits, shows the time of the Spanish invasion and the first settlers, gives inside into the developement of the republic and then switches over to winemaking (important in this area) and it exhibits also some railways.
The hotel Tierra y Vino is a very good and small hotel at the heart of Santa Cruz, Chile. It has only few rooms that are placed around a small garden with a pool at the center. The host is very friendly and organizes local tours like visits of wineries for you. A place to relax not far away from the not very touristic city center within the vineyards.
San Antonio, Chile is a small town and harbour on the same latitude as Santiago de Chile. Tourists most often pass it because they are going from Santiago to Valparaíso and Viña del Mar and then continue to the south. It is not the nicest city around but it is maybe a good stop on your way.
Not far away from the capital of Chile, Valparaíso was once an important harbour that has been threatened several times by major fires. After the opening of the Panama canal the harbour usage declined and most goods are now transported to the nearby harbour of San Antonio. The city has been founded in 1544 in an area where the native Changos were once living and it has always been an inspiration for writers and painters – that’s why this city is known around the world.
I always love to see cities from above. That’s why I climb church towers or get to mountains close to the city. In Santiago de Chile I was a bit disappointed because of the smog hanging over the city – there wasn’t much to see. But visiting the Cerro San Cristóbal in the city quarter Bellavista (a good joke) is still a good idea.
The hotel Principado de Asturias is a middle-class hotel in Santiago de Chile, Chile. It is a good place for a first night in a foreign country and it’s only some minutes from here to walk to the city center. The nearest metro station is Baquedano and in front of the hotel there is long stretched green park.